


The New Arrangement

by OlwenDylluan, Quilly



Series: Quodlibets [4]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, Brief Sensuality, Brief Sexuality, Family Drama, Family Secrets, Fatherly Panic, Gen, Growing Up is Hard, Occult Law, One Night Stands, Parental Rage, Psychological Torture, Seriously: Heavy Angst, Subterfuge, Summoning Circles, THE KIDS ARE ALL GROWN UP, Temptations and Blessings, What's this? A plot?, does it count as kid fic if the kids are snakes but so is one of the parents, parenting is hard, schooled by a teenager, wiggleverse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-20
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:07:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 47,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22326079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OlwenDylluan/pseuds/OlwenDylluan, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quilly/pseuds/Quilly
Summary: Rosa Fell-Crowley has a plan that's gonna turn reality on its head.She just has to survive her fathers' wrath and her new supervisors' expectations first.
Series: Quodlibets [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1589863
Comments: 290
Kudos: 164
Collections: Wiggleverse





	1. THE TEA PARTY

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Summer Blockbuster Teenage Angst Fest](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22110001) by [Quilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quilly/pseuds/Quilly). 
  * Inspired by [In Which In Language Strange She Said—‘I love thee true’](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20879981) by [OlwenDylluan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OlwenDylluan/pseuds/OlwenDylluan). 



> Hey, welcome to the Who Even Knows show with Quilly and Olwen! 
> 
> A few housekeeping notes:  
> 1\. THIS IS NOT A LINEAR STORY. This is not even a story with completed plot. This is a "Summer Blockbuster Angst Fest" installment that felt far too big and world-changing to go there, and then Olwen wrote an accompaniment that will be up after we get a few more details hashed out, and, well...here we are.  
> 2\. This is not a formal part of the Wiggleverse. Think of it more like an offshoot timeline of where the kids could possibly go once they reach adulthood.  
> 3\. We will be adding to this sporadically. No set plot in mind, no goal, just...a possibility. 
> 
> Enjoy the show!

Dagon, Lord of the Files, Master of Torments, was quite enjoying choking down her evening caffeine sludge when she found herself being violently transported and shunted into a summoning circle. This happened every few decades, but it had been a while since Dagon had been in a circle quite this roomy, and it had never contained an overstuffed armchair and a hot cup of tea. She blinked and looked around herself, noting the following: first, she appeared to be in a bookshop of some kind; second, the bookshop was suffused with the scent of angel and, if she sniffed very hard, Crowley; third, there was a second summoning circle near hers, and a teenage girl dressed in creams and browns was kneeling between the two, her hair a fluffy halo of pale curls and a book open in front of her.

Dagon stared at the chair, sniffed at the tea, and went to inspect the circle.

“Don’t waste your time, my Lord, the circle is quite secure,” the teenage girl said, and Dagon bared her teeth at her. The girl didn’t so much as blink. Dagon was a bit put out. Then she realized she still had her teeth, which didn’t often happen when she came topside, and frowned hard at it. If she touched her cheeks, she could feel the slippery fish scales that usually adorned them in Hell. “You’ll forgive me for putting off a proper introduction, but I need to gather my other guest first.”

“Other guest?” Dagon scowled, and cringed as the girl began to read. It had been a while, Enochian wasn’t in fashion Downstairs and hadn’t been since the Fall, but there was no mistaking it for anything but what it was. The girl’s voice had no true angelic power, or Dagon’s ears would have started bleeding, but it did itch at her in the way a mild headache did, right at the forefront of her skull between her eyes. The second circle shimmered, and flickered, and suddenly there was a tall figure standing in it, wearing a very pale grey suit and elaborate cravat and waterfall sleeves poking from her suit jacket, and Dagon almost swallowed her tongue. It was one thing to talk around the water cooler with Beelzebub and some of the other Lords of Hell about bringing the Archangel Michael to her knees; it was something else entirely to be suddenly in her company, without so much as a beer bottle to think about lighting a hellfire Molotov cocktail with.

“What is this?” the Archangel Michael demanded, striding forward and hitting the edge of the circle like a wall. She put her hands out to test it and scowled. “What have you done? Release me at once!”

“Oh, I wouldn’t try anything funny,” Dagon found herself saying, and Michael’s head whipped around and stared at Dagon with about equal confusion. Dagon found it suited her to act nonchalant, so she did, waving and settling in the provided armchair, picking up her teacup. The tea was quite good, actually, Dagon realized as she sipped it. Needed some infant’s blood, but that was hardly a common dietary need. Michael’s face turned an interesting color, and she turned back to the teenage girl.

“I don’t know what you think you’re trying to pull, young lady—”

“I’ll thank you to not call me that, I start uni quite soon,” the teenage girl said calmly, closing the book and rising. She stretched, and Dagon watched in utter fascination as pearly white scales shimmered into being across the girl’s cheeks. The girl opened her eyes and they were fully blue from side to side, the pupils slitted like a snake’s. She shimmied her shoulders, and a pair of wings unfolded, brightest white tapering down to an aged gold at the tips. Dagon raised her eyebrows. Michael appeared to be mouthing soundlessly, ignoring both the chair and the tea set out for her in her own summoning circle.

“That’s better,” the girl said brightly, and snapped her fingers. The lighting in the room went from dim to comfortable in an instant. “Now. Lord Dagon, Archangel Michael, I assume you already know each other?”

“I’m familiar,” Michael spat.

“’course,” Dagon shrugged, sipping at her tea. The level in the cup didn’t appear to be going down. Fascinating.

“Wonderful,” the girl smiled. “I assume you have some idea of who I am, but it’s terribly rude to begin negotiations without making a proper introduction, so.” The girl curtsied, her ruffled skirts well-suited for the motion. “Greetings. My name is Rosa Victoria Zipporah Fell-Crowley. I believe you know my fathers?”

Dagon idly tapped her foot against the wall of her summoning circle, then propped her feet up on it when it held. “Unfortunately,” Dagon said. “You’re one of the brats Hastur came raving to us about. Thought he was mad, we did. Sent the memo to Heaven for laughs.”

“Yes, we had quite a chuckle,” Michael said tightly. “I don’t know what trickery you’re pulling—”

“No tricks,” Rosa shook her head, “no lies, no subterfuge. I merely thought it was time we had a chat.”

“A chat,” Dagon repeated, slurping her tea obnoxiously. Michael’s jaw tightened the longer it went on. Dagon made the note to experiment further with the reactions she could draw from Michael with what little was available to her.

“Heaven doesn’t bargain with traitors and scum,” Michael said haughtily. Rosa smiled sweetly, and Dagon felt a flutter of anticipation in her belly.

“Oh, you’ll find I’m not asking,” Rosa said, and gestured at the circle. “Go on. Examine it. It’s perfectly sound, capable of holding you for quite some time. Not forever, I’m not that strong, but long enough to be terribly inconvenient.”

“They’ll notice I’m missing,” Michael said confidently. “You couldn’t fight anyone they would send to retrieve me.”

“And I have no plans to,” Rosa replied. “I wanted to offer a deal.”

Dagon choked on her tea. “Excuse me?” She put down her teacup as she started laughing—downright chortling. “What could you possibly have to offer us, little brat?”

“I gave you my name,” Rosa said. “I expect you to use it.” She brushed down her skirt and glanced at Michael. “You might as well get comfortable, I brewed the tea just before I summoned the both of you. Should still be hot.”

“I would prefer to stay where I am and not partake, thank you,” Michael growled.

“Suit yourself,” Rosa shrugged. Dagon wanted to take a handful of those perfect white-gold curls and yank, just to see what the little girl would do about it. A surreptitious probing of the circle found it was made like a brick wall, all interlocking sigils and proper wording. Ugh. She’d done her homework. “My fathers don’t know I’m doing this, so if you’re worried about incurring the attention of your former agents, the chances are highly unlikely.”

“Not a concern I had, no,” Dagon said breezily. Crowley might be a deviant in every possible sense, but she wasn’t afraid of him, not unless there was a tub of holy water nearby. That didn’t appear to be the case here.

“I don’t know which agent you mean,” Michael sniffed.

“No?” Rosa smiled, tilting her head. “Odd. I’m told I resemble Aziraphale very much, but I suppose it’s been a few years, and you never really paid him the attention he deserved, did you, Michael?”

She did, at that. Dagon had only seen Aziraphale’s renderings in briefs, but now that it was pointed out to her, she had to admit the resemblance was uncanny. Judging by Michael’s suddenly bloodless face (or was it ichorless? Dagon wasn’t too sure about how Heaven was wiring their corporations these days, but given the patches of gold still lingering on Michael’s skin, ichorless might be a good bet), she had realized it, too.

“When I get out of here, I am going to smite you out of existence,” Michael said. “Whatever you are, you shouldn’t—”

“I summoned you specifically, Archangel Michael, because I was led to believe that you have half a brain somewhere in your head,” Rosa interrupted smoothly. “Be reasonable. If I wasn’t supposed to exist, then I wouldn’t, and God Herself gave us Her blessing. Nothing happens without Her notice, and to some degree, without Her approval. I think if God had any intention of my personal destruction, all She would have to do would be to put the tiniest chink in that summoning circle you’ve been working so hard to get out of.” Rosa smiled sweetly. “I could call Gran up now and add her to the chat, but that’s for very special occasions, and I don’t think this really warrants Her personal attention, do you?”

Michael was breathing like she was running, and Dagon was fascinated by it all. Hastur had spent the past decade trying to convince them all that he hadn’t cracked, and Dagon always meant to follow up on the story in case it proved true (there was still the issue of the strange energy signatures in Crowley and Aziraphale’s cottage, which Beelzebub had strictly forbidden probing into after Hastur came back), but this was more entertaining than she had ever been expecting. She slurped her tea and watched the Archangel Michael try to summon her spear, or a sword, or lightning, or do much of anything other than beat ineffectually against the walls. She owed Rosa a favor just for the show of watching Michael come further and further apart.

“I am going to personally tear you apart limb from limb, child,” Michael swore in Enochian, and Dagon did wince at that. Like a lance to the eardrums, having true Holiness put into the words.

“Very disappointing,” Rosa said, and Dagon snorted. “I shall have to put you on mute until you calm down, Michael, do let me know when you’re ready to be reasonable.” Rosa snapped her fingers again, and suddenly Michael’s ravings were cut off (or, the sound was, anyway). “Lord Dagon? Is your tea acceptable?”

“Extremely,” Dagon nodded, smiling like a shark. “You’re a lunatic, little one. I like it.”

“I prefer eccentric,” Rosa said airily, and reached for her own teacup, sitting on a table behind her.

“You mentioned a deal,” Dagon said, shifting in her chair as Rosa pulled one up. How did a kid that looked so much like a little old librarian in petticoats turn out to be this entertaining? “I’m primed to listen, this has been great fun so far.”

“My tea parties usually are,” Rosa smiled. Dagon laughed. She couldn’t help it. “I have some questions for you first, if you don’t mind.”

“Ask away,” Dagon said, gesturing with her teacup. It didn’t spill over, even when she turned it upside down. Novel.

“How much does Hell know about my family? I assume Hastur told you quite a bit, when he got back.”

“Hastur didn’t half know what he saw, so his report was a bit muddled,” Dagon shrugged. “All he told us was that there were children who could turn into snakes living with the traitor Crowley and his angel squeeze. He didn’t know much more than that, so we didn’t put much more than that on record.”

“Why did no one investigate his claims?” Rosa asked.

“Well, it’s mad, isn’t it?” Dagon shrugged. “What even are you?”

“Half-angel half-demon shapeshifting snake child born from angelic belief and combination angelic and demonic love,” Rosa rattled off smartly, and Dagon half-closed her eyes against the information overload, shaking her head to maybe free up some space.

“Yeah. Mad,” Dagon nodded. “Why would we investigate that? We figured after Ligur melted before his very eyes, and Crowley splashed around in what was supposed to be his execution, he just sort of…” Dagon made the signal for “cuckoo” and shrugged, sipping her miraculous tea.

There was a large movement from the summoning circle beside them, and Dagon glanced over to see Michael waving her arms.

“Oh,” Rosa said, and snapped her fingers. “Are you ready to behave civilly?”

Michael glared down her nose, but she made a show of sitting neatly on the provided chair. She still didn’t touch the tea, but it was a sight more polite than threatening to smite their host every other sentence. Dagon was a little disappointed.

“I received a memo from Hell about a decade ago that one of their operatives had reportedly witnessed “five shape-changing children” near the residence of Aziraphale and the demon Crowley,” Michael said primly. “Gabriel had declared the matter closed a year or so before and so nothing was done about it. I didn’t even forward the memo, it wasn’t a very good joke.”

“I’m almost disappointed,” Rosa said, sipping her tea. “I suppose it can’t be helped.” She stretched her wings a little, adjusting them as she adjusted her sitting position on her poofy little stool. “What I want from both of you is a firm agreement that no operatives, administrators, adjuncts, associates, or proxies of Heaven and Hell will come after me and my family with intent to harm, and I wish for this to be strictly enforced. Breakage of this agreement will be met with swift and dire retribution upon the violating parties.”

“I see you do not do things by halves, Miss Rosa,” Michael said wryly, and Dagon was inclined to agree.

“What’s in it for us, if we agree to this?” Dagon asked.

Rosa tilted her head to consider this. “I summoned two of the highest-ranking officials of Heaven and Hell into my father’s bookshop after two years of study and preparation,” Rosa said. “This is a negotiation, yes, but perhaps you may also consider it my resume.”

“Your…what?” Dagon blinked.

“I’m sorry?” Michael said.

“We’re in a post-Apocalypse world,” Rosa said. “It spins on, because the Almighty wills it, despite all written evidence to suggest that wasn’t the Plan. Heaven and Hell are more or less irrelevant. Humanity continues on an even keel without interference.” Dagon considered this while Rosa took a long sip of her tea. “There are many avenues to take from here, but the one I’m offering is to take the place of my fathers. On a freelance basis, you understand.”

“I don’t follow,” Michael said. “Why would we need a freelance agent, especially one who’s also working for Hell?”

“Because without Aziraphale, you no longer have an agent on the ground who knows humanity and can blend in while still getting work done,” Rosa said, setting her tea to the side and neatly folding her hands in her lap. “And Hell is in the same position, with Crowley. Your last mistake, collectively, was underestimating Earth and the humans’ importance. I believe that was the triggering incident for the Fall, and subsequently the crux of the failure of Armageddon. Am I correct?”

Dagon tasted something foul in her mouth when the child mentioned the Fall and washed it down with five obnoxious gulps of tea. Michael looked like she smelled something dreadful. Rosa smiled benignly at them both, the pearly scales on her cheeks glinting and her crystal-blue snake eyes unblinking. Her wings rustled a bit.

“I can’t give Heaven and Hell a new purpose,” Rosa said. “Or, I could, but not one that would benefit me half as well as this…Arrangement I am proposing. I am willing to take on temptations from Hell and blessings from Heaven, so long as they are proportional and balanced, with the end goal being…cooperation, I suppose. Bringing balance back to the universe.”

“Balance?” Dagon cocked her head.

“Why do you think Heaven and Hell exist in the first place?” Rosa smiled. “Why do you think they continue to exist, along with the Earth?”

“Bizarre twist of fate,” Dagon said.

“Cosmic mistakes,” Michael added.

“Purposeful restructuring,” Rosa challenged. “I have a theory I’m willing to test out if neither of you agree to this proposal, and that theory is that Heaven and Hell will eventually fade out of relevance and existence, without something to drive them. War was clearly not the answer. Bumbling along waiting for the Almighty to tell Heaven what to do so Hell can rebel against it isn’t working out, either. But finding a purpose together, and sticking to it, seems like something we can do. Would you agree?”

Dagon thought it over. Yeah, the few years since the Abotchalypse had been pretty dull, but she wasn’t sure how she would sell this to the Dark Council. A niggling thought that had been there since the Fall but had really started revving up after Crowley’s failed execution nattered at her again: the Dark Council’s leadership, and Satan’s authority, had gotten them nowhere. Six thousand years down the toilet. Sure, the soul input was steady as ever, and humans continued to be chaotic without Crowley’s influence, but surely they could boost those numbers. To what end? Well…perhaps the gathering of souls _was_ the end, an inherent value. And, should The End ever decide to show itself…

“Let me put it a different way,” Rosa interjected. “Heaven is one side of a scale, Hell is the other. Let’s say Armageddon happened how it was meant to, and one side of the scales is obliterated. What is left?”

“Victory,” Michael said.

“A broken scale,” Dagon rolled her eyes, catching on to what the child was putting down.

“Nothing,” Rosa nodded. “Nothing fit for use. Entropy. The universe stops spinning. It all comes crashing down. One side won against the other, and what it wins is oblivion.”

“What are you saying?” Michael demanded.

“I’m saying Heaven and Hell can’t exist without each other,” Rosa said. “Nor can they exist without Earth. Earth seems to be doing fine without either of them, but if Earth and life is one side of the scale, Heaven, Hell, and death must be the other side. I think, between us, we can stop Heaven and Hell from sliding into irrelevance, perhaps stop them from ceasing to exist altogether the further they get from their intended cosmic counterweight. This is where I come in.” Rosa stood. “I do jobs for both Heaven and Hell. I bring them back into relevance with Earth. I even the score, and keep it even. The universe spins on indefinitely and doesn’t careen off into an unbalanced, ignominious end.”

Dagon wondered if Beelzebub would be on board and immediately knew ze would—Rosa would likely report more directly to herself and Michael, which would leave Beelzebub’s hands free to match wits for eternity with zir own pet angel. She looked at Michael and was surprised to find Michael looking back thoughtfully.

“I know Gabriel would like the chance to worry less about Earth and more about his…Prince of Hell problems,” Michael said, and Dagon beamed. “I would be more than willing to be your direct supervisor in this endeavor.”

“I think Beelzebub would find it very agreeable,” Dagon nodded. “I was never Crowley’s manager, but I wouldn’t mind taking on that challenge for this.”

“So you agree?” Rosa asked, and Dagon shrugged, sucking tea in through her teeth this time. Michael’s jaw had a tic jumping in it, but she nodded.

“There will be conditions,” Michael said. “I will expect my blessings to be done to the letter.”

“Oh, same,” Dagon nodded. “Might even assign you some helpers now and then for the big stuff.”

“They would answer directly to me,” Rosa said immediately. “I’ll not have a Duke of Hell waltzing into Earth thinking they know better than I do when they’ve never been here more than a few hours at a time.”

“I see no problem with that, given you prove yourself,” Dagon said. “Well, wank-wings? What do you think?”

Michael visibly bristled at the term but gave a very pained smile. “Let’s take this on a trial basis and see how it goes,” she said. “I’m not fully convinced we need this.”

“Then I’ll let my results speak for themselves,” Rosa said, and gently stretched out her wings to their full length, giving them a tiny flap. “I think I’ve run through the extent of my strength, so I’ll send you both back now. It was lovely having you both here. We should chat again soon.”

“Yes, we should, there’s paperwork to sign,” Dagon said gleefully. She hadn’t done any relevant paperwork in so long.

“We will speak again very soon, I should think,” Michael nodded. Dagon quickly sucked down another mouthful of tea before there was a pop, a displacement of air, and she was stuffed back down into Hell, right into her desk chair. She had to blink a few times to re-acclimate to the dark, which was embarrassing, but as soon as she was, she batted her ancient boxy computer awake and opened an interdepartmental chat window with Michael.

**Did that really just happen?**

_Were we just held almost at ransom by a child? Yes, I think that did happen, in fact._

**I like her.**

_You would._

**I think she talks too much but she had a point. I haven’t felt like I’ve been working towards a tangible goal in over a decade.**

_It has been rather quiet since that…fiasco._

Dagon let the chat sit for a minute while she tongued the last of the caffeine sludge from her mug, long gone solid in the bottom of it. Her dawdling was rewarded.

_What the Hell. It could be fun._

Dagon barked a laugh that had an assistant ducking for cover under a nearby desk.

**More fun than stabbing out an Archangel’s eyes? No. More fun than dealing with Satan’s bellyaching over rebellious children? Yes.**

Both Dagon and Michael were soon to find out that Rosa had taken negotiation tips from a master and her contracts were binding, Divinely so, but what Dagon was losing in face she found was worth the cost in entertainment, and entertainment had always been prime currency in Hell.

Just wait until the kid had been trained up a bit more and Dagon told Hastur he had a new supervisor on Earth whenever he was sent up for jobs again. That would be worth twelve signatures in her own blood rather than just the four.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (A minor note to say that Dagon's characterization has been cheerfully inspired by PeniG's "Akashic Records" series, I highly recommend it and especially the bits with Dagon in them.)


	2. In Which Lines Are Drawn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The New Arrangement is in effect. Now comes the hard part...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to more Who Even Knows show with Quilly and Olwen! 
> 
> Remember, this is non-linear. It's sheer coincidence that this scene takes place after Quilly's first chapter. (This is also not the first thing that I've written for this story, but I can't post the other thing until we've hammered out/written more stuff because SPOILERS.)

“You did _what?”_

Rosa tore open another packet of sugar and poured it into her tea, stirring it calmly.

“I know you heard me. Don’t be dramatic.”

“Apparently _one_ of us has to be,” Angelica hissed across the café table. “You’re far too calm for someone who knowingly made such a gigantic mistake.”

“You’re overreacting.”

“I’m overreacting? What do you call _summoning a freaking Archangel and Lord of Hell?_ ”

“Business,” Rosa said, lifting her teacup to her lips. She met Angelica’s eyes calmly over the rim.

“Father’s going to—” Angelica inhaled sharply, her eyes widening. “ _Azirafather._ Rosa, Azirafather will—”

Rosa set her teacup down with a click on the saucer.

“You cannot,” she said precisely, “possibly throw anything at me that I have not already considered myself. Please give me some credit, Angelica.”

“You’ll pardon me if I doubt that entirely in every way, because you have just told me you summoned Michael and Dagon for a _business proposition._ And if that doesn’t convince everyone that you’ve finally cracked—”

“Angelica,” Rosa said clearly, with a warning tone under the name. “It was the most sensible thing I could do.”

Angelica snorted and picked up her coffee.

“Your definition of sensible and everyone else’s definition of sensible—especially our dads’—are spectacularly different.”

“I did it for them,” Rosa said. “And the rest of us. But mainly for them.”

Angelica stared at her, then sat back in her chair, running a hand over the shaved side of her head. The tumble of curls down the other side with their streak of white brushed against her shoulder as she shook her head.

“You really believe that.”

“I planned this for thirty months, weighing the pros and cons at every stage. Yes.”

“Does anyone else know?”

“Not yet.” Rosa touched her finger to a few grains of sugar on her saucer. “You’re the first I've told.”

Angelica snorted.

“I’m likely the safest. Junior would shout a lot, Datura would be terribly disappointed in you, and Clem would hide.”

“If we’re going to share a flat off and on, you’re going to need to know.”

“How generous,” Angelica snarked. “Giving me a heads-up that Heaven or Hell may stop by with an assignment for you.”

Rosa said nothing, picking up her tea again. Angelica sighed explosively and took her own coffee, crossing her legs and looking around. She paused when she caught their reflection in the window, white curls and red. Had Father and Azirafather ever sat like this in a coffee shop or bistro, arguing about their Arrangement? Chances were good Father had been railing at Azirafather about something stupidly dangerous but well-meant, if they had.

“Well, at least it runs in the family,” she muttered.

“What does?”

“Clever idiocy.” Angelica sighed again and set down her coffee, dropping her head into her hands. “How the heck are you going to fit this into studying law, for Somebody’s sake?”

“It’s not like a part-time job. It’s a once in a while thing.”

“If you think they’re not going to gleefully call you when it’s the most inconvenient as possible, you’re delusional.”

“Thank you, Angelica. It’s always so lovely to be supported by family.”

“Well, it’s your funeral.” Angelica stood up, slinging her gym bag over her shoulder. “Your bed, lie in it, etcetera.”

“Angelica,” Rosa said, looking up at her. “I have to… I need to be the one to tell them. Eventually. Please?”

“Please don’t tell our dads that you’ve entered into a binding contract with the entities that ruined their lives?” Angelica shook her head. “You know, Rosa, I honestly believe they _should_ know, and as soon as possible, because they’re going to need to run damage control when you screw up, and they deserve to be prepared for that. But no. No, I’m not going to tattle. You’re going to have to stand in front of them, look them in the eyes, and ruin their lives all on your own.”

Rosa kept her eyes on her teacup.

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

“I think you’re incredibly cruel and selfish,” Angelica said. “You’ve justified this to yourself somehow, and I will not in a million years _ever_ be able to understand how. I refuse to let you ruin _my_ life, however. I will not get involved. We’ll share the bookshop flat as we need while we both study here in the city, but stay out of my way.”

Angelica walked away before Rosa could say anything else. The bell over the café door jangled behind her, and Rosa saw Angelica stride past the café window outside, her face thunderous and her steps angry.

One down.

She lifted the cold tea to her lips.


	3. REVENGE OF HASTUR 2: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Could it be??? An actual plot???? (Mind the tags, added a couple relevant ones)
> 
> This was...going to be an Angst Fest update, but then we got to talking, and, well, here we are, a relevant plot thread to throw out. We are going to be following a very vague linearity while we throw stuff at this semblance-of-a-plot before it sinks into something more episodic; y'all are welcome to hang onto your butts, it's gonna be a bumpy ride.
> 
> A direct sequel to the first chapter of Summer Blockbuster Angst Fest, if the chapter of this title didn't give it away already.

Junior had been at uni for about a month when they started.

University life was pretty good; Junior wasn’t sure what he wanted to major in or even why he was here, but it had seemed like a good way to kill time, and besides, the girls were in school and Datura had an apprenticeship. Clem did whatever Clem wanted, bouncing between home and Rosa’s flat above the bookshop. Junior…eh. Junior was on good terms with his flatmates and had only drunk himself stupid once so far, which was a pretty good track record for him, all told. “Once” being “now”, passed out on his bed and halfway to snoring before he was even properly asleep. The hangover wouldn’t be great but he had the trick Azirafather taught him about expelling the alcohol and that would help out some. Maybe.

None of that was relevant right now, because at the moment he was having a very vivid dream about being tied to a chair and not in a sexy way.

It was hard to forget Hastur, Duke of Hell, and Junior certainly hadn’t. He shrunk down despite himself as the tall, menacing stack of foul-smelling demon prowled around him, smoking a cigarette and looking at him thoughtfully.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Junior said, hopefully sounding much braver than he felt. He did his best to relax, which was hard when he was in the universe’s most uncomfortable folding-back chair and tied to it with scratchy black ropes. Hastur exhaled a plume of smoke and studied Junior with those eerie flat frog’s eyes.

“You’re far from home, little snake,” Hastur croaked. “I reckon I can do about anything I want, now.”

Junior swallowed down his panic, which was exceedingly difficult—he remembered quite vividly being much smaller and held aloft by the shirt front by this guy—and lounged like his life depended on it. “Bit boring, isn’t it? Stalking kids?”

“You’re not just a kid,” Hastur grunted. “Look just like him, you do. Makes me angry.” Hastur smiled and something black and viscous dripped from behind his teeth as he did. “He’s off-limits, he is. You, though. Little Crowley. We’re going to have fun together, you and me.”

“No, thanks,” Junior said, glad that in the dream he still had his shades, because he didn’t fancy Hastur knowing explicitly how terrified Junior was at this moment. How had Azirafather done him in, again? Something to do with a sword. Junior wiggled his fingers behind his back and concentrated. Sword, sword, sword…anything flaming and sharp, something to get him out of here…

“Wasn’t asking,” Hastur said, and reached into his pocket. Junior tensed until Hastur came away with a grubby sort of clicker. Then he stared.

“What, are you joking?” Junior snorted. “This a guys’ night where we watch movies and eat popcorn and one of us is tied up, then?”

“Something like that,” Hastur said, and clicked. Junior hadn’t paid much attention to the room around them, but now that he was, it was exactly the sort of place he would have imagined Hell would be, once Father explained it: dark and dank and damp and disgusting, and somehow with a grimy old-fashioned projector tarp set up against one wall. With the clicker, the projector hanging by a thread from the ceiling hummed to life, and Junior realized he was watching some kind of movie. There was a very lush garden, a very nude dark-skinned woman, and whispering in her ear, a very large snake. Junior knew that snake intimately, several dozen feet of bone-crushing black-scaled muscle with a brilliant vermillion belly and sly ochre eyes.

“What is this?” Junior asked, and jumped when he realized Hastur had pulled up another folding chair and was sitting next to him, sitting in the chair backwards. The cigarette in his mouth burned down to the filter and he sucked it into his mouth and chewed, taking out another cigarette before answering. The fumes were putrid.

“History lesson,” Hastur said, lighting up his entire fist with hellfire. “I was just going to kill you. Make it hurt, absolutely. Do every little thing I’ve ever wanted to do to Crowley, only to his little copy. Bet you’d scream the same.” Hastur gazed at Junior with something akin to hunger in his eyes, though it was decidedly more murderous. Then he blinked. “Then I thought…what’s that he said? More to being evil than just killing people?”

“He has a point,” Junior said.

“Shut it,” Hastur said. “Been thinking for a long time, how to get back at Crowley for what he did to poor Ligur. Hated Ligur, I did, bit less than most other people. Always had a smoke.” Hastur seemed to get lost for a moment, during which moment Junior tried his best to summon something. Scissors, a butter knife, a hacksaw, anything.

Hastur shook himself out of his own reminisces and took a deep pull on his cigarette, blowing the smoke directly into Junior’s face. “Then I thought, why not be clever, eh? Killing you would be fine, but that pain would get better, eventually. Heal over. And maybe the holy water trick was too fast. Destroyed forever, but the suffering’s over too quick. Want something always sharp, always present.”

“So…you’re making me watch…what is this, exactly?” Junior asked, and realized that on the screen, the woman was walking towards an apple tree.

“Temptations,” Hastur said. “All of Crowley’s temptations. Pulled some favors with the Earth Observation department. Got some footage I thought might interest you.”

“Right. So.” Junior knocked his heels together a few times. That also did not work to get him out of this situation, but worth a shot. “The point is…?”

“Oh, I’m showing you your new duties,” Hastur said, and Junior frowned.

“My…what?”

“You’re my…what’s the word? Intern,” Hastur said, and clapped Junior on the shoulder, his bony fingers biting into Junior’s flesh. “So I’m showing you what your old man did, and what you’re going to be doing for me.”

The woman bit into the apple and opened her eyes. There was some new fire behind them, a spark of knowing that hadn’t been there before. She offered the apple to another nude dark-skinned figure, a man, and it finally clicked for Junior what he was witnessing: this was Eve’s temptation. It didn’t look like much, did it? Just a giant snake hissing in a lady’s ear.

“So I’m going to be hiding in bushes and forcing fruit on people?” Junior deadpanned, frustrated with his inability to conjure so much as a nail file. So he started picking at the ropes around his wrists with his nails instead, imagining they were long and sharp. He felt that particular imagining take effect when he nicked himself on accident. Okay, they were getting somewhere. “Bit low-stakes for Hell, isn’t it?”

“Keep watching,” Hastur said, and clicked his clicker again.

The scene changed, and Junior recognized his father, long-haired and black-robed, slinking through a crowded city street. He looked one way, then the other, and slid up next to an angry-looking young man and whispered in his ear. The young man nodded, and a cheesy star-wipe faded to the young man standing over a body in an alleyway, holding a bloodied knife in one hand and what looked like a bulging purse in the other. Okay. That was a bit more extreme than lobbing apples at people.

Hastur clicked. Junior watched Crowley lounging in Egypt, decked out in gold and drinking wine, and saw him talking to someone in a funny hat that looked like they were probably in charge; another star-wipe and Junior flinched as he watched a platoon of blade-wielding Egyptian guards flooding some kind of slum and slaughtering babies.

Hastur clicked. Crowley was sitting on a rooftop drinking with a different sort of king and pointed out a woman bathing not too far away.

Click. Crowley talking quietly to another young woman, who went and cut her lover’s hair and betrayed him to people who put out his eyes and chained him.

Click. Crowley snapping his fingers and producing a bag full of silver coins, which he threw to the people he was playing some kind of gambling game with and shrugging, and those silver coins later being offered to a man who betrayed his friend by kissing his cheek.

Click. Click. Click.

If Junior had any sense of time in the dream, he would have thought he’d been there for days, watching every horrible thing Crowley had ever done for Hell. It was one thing to be told growing up that Father had to do some bad things in the past to keep himself and Azirafather safe. It was another thing to watch Father smile and tease and lead people to death and ruin with the face of a friend. Junior felt something thick welling up in his throat as he swallowed. He’d almost managed to pick through the ropes holding his wrists.

“Plenty more stuff he took credit for I couldn’t find him doing,” Hastur said during a reel of Father leading an army of rats into a telecommunications tower, which wasn’t evil so much as the brand of mischief Junior was used to and it was a nice respite. “Don’t think he ever managed to do half of what he said, really, but what’s he gonna do, get in trouble in Hell for lying?” Hastur made a rusty sound that Junior interpreted as laughter.

“Seems like the humans get on with enough on their own to me,” Junior said, and Hastur laughed again.

“Could always be doing worse,” he said, and clicked his clicker. The reel stopped on a single photo of someone Junior vaguely recognized as a guy in his maths class. “This one, for instance. Need you to kill him.”

“No,” Junior said, feeling the ropes growing thin under his claws, “I don’t think so. What happened to evil being about more than just killing people?”

“Well, I didn’t finish the story,” Hastur said, and casually backhanded Junior across the face so hard his neck popped. Junior gasped more than cried out. “He was talking to Ligur at the time, see. Ligur said that might be the case, but killing people’s fun.”

“Fun?” Junior scowled, and had a moment to blink and register Hastur looming over him before a white-hot pain on the back of his neck registered and he screamed.

“Fun,” Hastur repeated, finishing up with stubbing his cigarette out on the back of Junior’s neck and flicking it away. “You’ve got a week, Crowley. I expect results.”

Junior told him to do something to himself that Azirafather would have washed his mouth out for if Junior had said it to anyone other than Hastur, probably, and Hastur in response grabbed him by the hair and forced his head back.

“One week,” he repeated, “or I go back to my original plan.” Hastur’s black-rimmed ragged fingernails traced around the orbital bone of Junior’s eye, then ripped the sunglasses from his face, crushing them to powder. “Start with one of the eyes, I think.”

Junior woke up with a pounding heart, a phantom pain on the back of his neck, and the smell of tobacco and rot heavy in his nose. Also hung over like nobody’s business, but that he could shake, unlike the terror when he looked himself over in the mirror and realized there were smudges of black around one of his eyes, like very dirty fingers had been touching him.

He should call Father. He should call Azirafather. He should go home and ask about warding, about protecting himself, or maybe just never leave the basement again.

Junior went back to bed and stared up at the ceiling for a very long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I promise this will have a happy resolution, but we've gotta wade through some Stuff before we get there. I promise our boy is going to be okay. Eventually.


	4. The Snake That Cannot Shed Its Skin Perishes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes family can be a real pain in the neck... and that's not always a bad thing.

Datura pushed Clem's wheelchair up the ramp they'd installed a few years ago.

"You're heavier than you were the last time we did this,” they muttered.

“It’s the muscle that’s developed from moving this chair around,” Clem said nonchalantly.

“Yeah, well, when you’ve figured out how to roll up inclines, my time behind these handles is done.” Datura closed the door behind them and looked around. “Rosa?” they called. “You here?”

“No,” a voice answered.

"Okay," Clem said. “Tura, order the pizzas. I’ll get the Xbox and the TV out of the car and set them up.”

“You didn’t.”

“We might have. You'll have to unearth yourself from your books to check.”

“Clem William Oscar, you are a terrible person," Rosa said. She emerged disapprovingly from the gloom of the bookshelves, her white hair up in a messy twist, a pencil stabbed through it to keep it in place. Datura moved forward to kiss her cheek.

“Hey, Rosa. Thanks for letting us crash here.”

“I have an exam coming up,” she said in reply, turning away to vanish into the back of the shop again. “Don’t disturb me.”

Clem and Datura exchanged grins.

“Is Gel around?”

“Angelica spends more time at her friends’ places than here,” Rosa’s voice drifted back. “I’m serious. Don’t bother me. This exam is worth a quarter of my class mark.”

A.Z. Fell & Co hadn’t been an operative bookshop in years—one could make the case that it hadn’t ever been an operative bookshop, really—but the family still used it as a pied-à-terre in the city when required. Rosa (and Angelica, theoretically) currently used it as their home base while they followed their courses of study, one law and the other sports therapy. Junior had roommates across town closer to whichever school he was attending. Datura and Clem weren’t entirely sure where that was, or what he was studying, frankly.

“I’m going to bring the bags in, Clem,” Datura said. “You changing?”

“Soon, I think.” Clem heard the door close and rolled his chair around behind the magnificent wooden spiral staircase, closer to the back room that Azirafather had used as a study when they were tiny new noodles.

“I can hear you,” she said. “Go away, Clem.”

“Okay,” he said, but kept rolling closer. He stopped in the archway to the back room and looked around. The desk was covered with books and papers, and there was a laptop open on the table to the side. A tablet was also among the books, and Rosa was scrolled through it, her forehead resting in one hand.

“Does the meaning of ‘leave me alone’ escape you?” she said, not looking up.

“I get the feeling you may need a break,” he said.

“From disturbances? Yes, absolutely.”

“Rosa,” he said gently. She dropped her hand and let it strike the table heavily.

“Clem, you are my favourite brother, but you really need to lay off.”

They heard the door open and a thud of bags hitting the floor.

“Bags are in,” Datura said into the shop. “I’m going to go pick up dinner. Indian?”

“Tandoori chicken, please,” Clem said. He raised an eyebrow at Rosa, who huffed in exasperation. “Rosa wants butter chicken. And lots of naan.”

“And a cardamom rose lassi, please,” Rosa said, pitching her voice so Datura could hear it, glaring at Clem, who smiled back.

“Coming up,” Datura said cheerfully. “I’m walking, just so you know.”

“Can’t lose that parking spot,” Clem said. “Any further away and we’d have to call an Uber to get to it.”

Datura snorted and closed the door.

Clem looked back at Rosa. Rosa stared at him, then blew a wisp of hair out of her face and pointedly looked back at her work.

“I’ll make a cup of tea, shall I?” Clem said, backing up and turning. Rosa ignored him.

She ignored the cup of tea he brought to her wordlessly, as well. He didn’t push it, just rolled back out to find Azirafather’s cloth napkins and some forks in the tiny kitchenette.

Datura returned later loaded down with bags, and Rosa came out to join them sullenly. They ate, Datura and Clem talking about home—Father was having words with the orchard, which had decided to start growing a different kind of apple without his permission; Reverend Kim had a new assistant who was terribly enthusiastic, and Azirafather was exhausted trying to keep up with their theological debates. Rosa ate her butter chicken moodily, commenting in monosyllables first, but gradually relaxing into a more typical kind of Fell-Crowley meal conversation.

Clem was pleasantly full by the end, which meant he started getting sleepy. Datura laughed at him and said something about somnolent serpents, and Rosa teased him about having eaten a small goat’s worth of tandoori and naan. He took their teasing good-naturedly, the way he did just about everything.

Rosa started tidying up and Datura yawned. 

“I have more studying to do,” she sighed, tucking takeaway containers into one of the paper bags.

“We’ll leave you to it,” Datura said. “Ready, Clem?”

Clem nodded, shifting into his large snake form and slithering down out of his chair. He paused at the bottom of the stairs and looked at the gallery above.

“Not up to it?” Datura said, pausing next to him. Clem sighed.

_I’m full of takeaway._

“Which means you’re going to be even heavier to heft up there.” Datura sighed back, dramatically. Clem gave them the side-eye, and Rosa snickered behind them. “It would serve you right if I left you down here.”

 _I don’t actually have to be upstairs,_ Clem pointed out.

“He won’t bother me if you leave him here,” Rosa said. “It’s not like he’s Anthony, who has trouble keeping his mouth shut; I swear he talks just to hear his own voice.”

Clem headed for the worn settee, lifting his upper body enough to flow over the arm and onto the body itself. Datura waved and grabbed their bag, then carried it up the winding stairs and vanished.

 _Goodnight, Rosa,_ Clem said, winding himself into a pile and tucking his head into the centre.

“Goodnight, Clem,” she said. She paused in the entrance to the study. “I’m sorry I was so irritated before.”

 _It’s okay,_ he said. _We all have bad days._

“I know, but.” She sighed. “Things have been weird. Hard.”

_Do you want to talk about it?_

“Maybe someday. I can’t right now.”

_Whenever you need to._

“You’re the only one I could talk to about it, you know. If I ever get to that point.”

_I love you, too._

“Go to sleep, Clem.”

  
  


He woke up abruptly, which was the first surprise. It took a lot to wake Clem when he slept in snake form, which was most of the time. It was late; very late. At first he was disoriented, rapidly scenting the air to situate himself. The dry taste of book dust and tea in the air, the first air he’d ever scented, reassured him that he was in the dark shop.

But there was another energy he tasted in that air, one that he couldn’t recognize right off the bat, but which set off some kind of screaming deep in his subconscious. Discomfited and nervous, he lifted his head more and cast about, trying to pinpoint the source.

There was a faint gleam on the surface of the polished wooden counter Azirafather had used for his antique register, so faint from this distance that Clem didn’t trust his eyes not to be making it up. He lifted his upper body off the settee and flowed to the floor, weaving through silent tables and displays.

The unnerving feeling grew stronger as he approached the counter, and his healthy streak of self-preservation suggested that this was a bad, bad idea. He couldn’t put his finger on the energy, and that worried him. Something deep inside him knew it well enough to react to it, but he couldn’t tell why or how.

At the register he lifted his head up and up, using his strong muscles to balance himself so that he could look over the edge without touching the counter. He had been right; there was the faintest of glows coming from something centered on the polished wooden surface. It was a pale legal-size grey envelope, thick with papers inside, the flap sealed with a black wax wafer that looked as if it had been melted on with a blowtorch, the paper of the envelope around it browned and brittle.

And on the envelope, his sister’s name was inscribed with thin threads of firey ink.

  
  


Rosa woke with a start, her head lifting from her folded arms that rested on the desk and her papers. Clem was looming over her and radiating a mess of emotion. She picked out indignation and anxiety and anger before his enormous head, bronze eyes gleaming in the dimness of the study lit only by a screensaver, darted down toward her. He dropped a large flat packet of something on the cluttered desk in front of her, and her eyes caught the spidery fire ink Dagon used to address her assignments. Suddenly, she was fully awake.

 _What is going on, Rosa?_ Clem demanded, fear making him snap at her. _How does Hell know your name? How did they find you, and why are they sending you things?_

“Clem, I need you to—”

 _We’ll call Father and Azirafther right away_ , he went on, starting to sway back and forth, looking from one side of the room to the other, almost as if he was pacing. _I’ll wake Datura and we’ll take you home. It’s too dangerous for you to stay when—_

“Clem, no—we don’t need to—”

_They’ve discovered that we’re Father’s children somehow, and they’ve figured out you and Angelica live in the bookshop. We’re all in terrible danger. We’ll be safer at home, in the basement while Father and Azirafather—_

“They’ll just send another packet!” Rosa said crossly. Clem stopped his nervous sway-pacing and stared at her.

_They’ll… what?_

“Clem,” Rosa said. “I promise, we’re not in danger. I promise. I need you to take some deep, slow breaths, and… and listen to what I have to say. Can you do that for me?”

Clem stared at her for a few heartbeats.

_Listen. To what you have to say. Is this… is this what you couldn’t talk about?_

Rosa made fists on the table and looked down at them.

“Yes,” she said softly. “And I could really use a friend right now.”

Another few heartbeats of silence. 

_Are you sure you’re not in danger?_

She gave a tired laugh.

“My ironclad contract dictates that absolutely none of us are to be targets, ever. That was the point.”

Clem felt as if his stomach dropped, which was a queer feeling indeed in snake form.

 _Do… you want me to make tea?_ It was Azirafather’s fallback, and Clem now had insight as to why. It was a familiar, normal thing to do to push away whatever was happening, and it also gave everyone a few moments to gather themselves. Azirafather, Clem decided, was a genius.

“I’ll do it,” she said, standing up and edging around the desk. “A pot would do us good.” 

_Should I wake—_

“No,” she said quickly. “Don’t—please. I can’t… I can’t face them. It’s hard enough telling you.”

Clem moved his head to rest it on her shoulder.

 _I’m here,_ he said. Rosa lifted her hand and touched his neck, leaning her head against his.

“I’m… I’m glad,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

They stood like that for a minute or so, until Clem drew back and looked at her.

_Go make your tea. And then you can tell me what the heck is going on._

  
  


She brought a pot and a cup, and a soup bowl for Clem. He did that little slow-motion head toss that was his equivalent to rolling his eyes, but she poured tea into it anyway. Then she sat on the floor with her back to the settee, her warm cup cradled between her hands, and Clem adjusted himself behind her so that his scales pressed reassuringly along her shoulders and upper back.

_Who do I have to crush in my coils?_

She laughed tiredly. “No one, Clem. If anyone is to blame, it’s me.”

He waited.

“Two years ago—”

 _Wait wait—_ **_two years_** _?_

“This is going to take forever if you interrupt after every three words.”

_Sorry. Sorry._

“Two years ago I started thinking about how we always had that low-level anxiety about someone figuring out who we were and where. The encounter with Hastur didn’t seem to initiate any further investigation, and Father worked on us handling our energy to appear unremarkable and pass as human, while Azirafather taught us to guard ourselves physically and spiritually. I was interested enough to ask Azirafather to teach me more about celestial and occult workings, because the mechanics fascinated me. Enochian was just another language, albeit one I couldn’t speak if Father was around.” She took a sip of tea and looked over her shoulder at him. “With me so far?”

_You’re too interested in tricky things that can get complicated fast. Got it. What happened next?_

“Well, as I studied I started to look at separate things and wonder what would happen if I put them together. Stacked them, sort of; overlapped them. Azirafather was very agreeable about discussing hypotheticals. I think he really enjoyed it, actually; I don’t think he’s had many opportunities to talk theory about angelic magics with people who have different mindsets and thought processes than angels do.”

Clem reached over to the bowl of tea on the table and lowered his mouth into it. Everything tasted different in snake form, even tea. It was both stronger and more complex. The bergamot really came out in this particular blend. Rosa looked amused that he was making the awkward attempt, which was exactly what he’d been trying for.

_Go on. How did you get from talking theory with Azirafather to being in Hell’s sights?_

“Over those two years I gradually designed a theoretical layered binding circle. One that I could tweak to bond angelic energy, or demonic. It took me a while to actually attempt it, though. I couldn’t practice at home, of course. So I’d stay after school or go out into the woods, far enough away that Father and Azirafather couldn't sense it.”

_We always thought you were reading._

“It wasn’t a bad assumption. I usually went out with a pile of books and my notes, after all.” She sighed. “Father and Azirafather were always concerned about someone figuring out what we were and what might happen as a consequence, all throughout our childhood. It… really affected me. They were always so _worried._ And I wondered if there was a way to fix things so that they wouldn’t have to worry any more. They deserve a real retirement, time to actually enjoy themselves instead of stressing about Heaven or Hell coming after us all. They didn’t have much time to do that between the Attemptolypse and having a family.”

 _I can see that,_ Clem said. _How did you jump to—_

“I’m getting there, Clem. I promise.”

He nodded and adjusted his coils behind her, trying to remind her that he was present for her.

“So I started planning a way to ensure that the whole family could be safe forever. We have no idea what our lifespans are going to be like, but I wanted to make sure we’d _all_ be okay no matter what, when, or where. And especially that Father and Azirafather would have guaranteed immunity for eternity.”

 _Rosa,_ Clem said, a dreadful feeling dawning on him, _did you sell your soul to Hell for all this?_

She huffed and set her teacup down on the table with a clack.

“ _Honestly_ , Clem, how stupid do you think I am? Give me some credit, _please_.”

 _Sorry,_ he said contritely.

“I summoned a Lord of Hell and an Archangel and offered them a proposal: my services as an agent on Earth in exchange for leaving everyone in the family alone.”

There was an odd ringing in his head.

 _I’m sorry,_ he said. _You what?_

“I took those years of practice to construct solid binding circles tailored to their intended subjects, worked out summoning rituals, and drafted and redrafted an offer of service that had zero loopholes or weak points. And it worked.”

_Rosa, that's—when? When did you do this?_

“About three months ago.”

_How—what do—_

“I do jobs for them. Small things. Influencing, really. Nothing like what Father or Azirafather could do; I’m not that powerful. But having an agent on the ground who actually knows the environment and how society works, the way Father and Azirafather used to, is useful to them. They accepted the proposal, and it’s even; if I do a job for Hell, I do one for Heaven, to keep things balanced.”

Clem drew back and shook his head. _I can’t,_ he said. _I can’t wrap my mind around this._

“So far, it’s okay. I’ve only done a couple of jobs. They were both tiny.”

 _Tiny for you, maybe_ , Clem said. _They could have had major consequences on the lives of the people you touched, or the lives of the people their lives touch._

“I can’t let myself think about that for too long.” Rosa looked out into the dark bookshop, the shelves and tables all vague shadowy shapes. “I’m trying to keep it level. Even. And I keep reminding myself that it’s to keep the rest of you safe from both Heaven and Hell, forever.”

Clem fought the urge to duck his head down into the centre of his pile of coils. This was huge, a staggering revelation, and he was torn between hiding and calling out for Father.

He looked at Rosa, who had her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms around them. She seemed smaller than usual.

She had done such an enormous thing. If she had managed that, he could muster the pluck to handle the knowledge.

He moved his head forward and rested it on her shoulder.

 _That took a lot of courage,_ he said.

She shrugged.

_So did telling me._

“I only told you because you saw the envelope.”

_Yes. But I think maybe, deep down, you’re glad someone knows._

“I told Angelica,” she said dully. “I had to. For this exact reason, actually. I thought it was better that I tell her instead of her finding out when an angel or demon showed up unannounced.”

_How did that go?_

Rosa snorted. “She’s not here, is she.”

 _She… left you?_ Clem was aghast. How could any of them even _consider_ abandoning a sibling?

“Effectively, yes. She thinks I’m arrogant and meddling with things far out of my control.”

 _Well_... Clem said.

“I am also single-handedly ruining this family, and will be responsible for Father and Azirafather’s obliteration. She threatened to tell them.”

 _I think that’s a not-unpredictable response_ , Clem pointed out. _It was my first instinct after getting you to safety._

“So I was told to stay out of her way while I courted my own destruction.”

Clem had always been good at intuiting his siblings’ feelings. Rosa’s irritation and scoffing were an awful lot like Father’s when he felt emotionally overwhelmed or unprepared to handle something. Beyond that, he knew Rosa, knew her well, and knew how lonely she must be feeling through all this.

 _Hey,_ he said. _Are you going to open the assignment?_

“What... now?”

 _I assume time is usually of the essence with these things,_ he said.

“I was going to wait…”

_Until we were gone? Not going to happen. You don't have to do this alone, Rosa._

“That was the whole point of this,” she said acerbically.

_Yeah, well, see, I know now, and I'm not going to leave you alone about it._

“Clem, don’t be ludicrous.”

_I’m not. You went into this planning to stand alone, solitary and tragic—_

“Excuse me?”

_Hi, I’m Clem, I’ve known you from birth?_

“You're not injecting yourself into my business. Please respect my request and—”

 _Nope._ Clem slithered off the settee, his heavy coils making a dry rustling sound as he headed for Rosa’s desk in the study. _I’m overruling you. As your older brother._

Rosa got to her feet, indignant.

“You are _not_ my—”

 _We don’t know who’s older other than Anthony,_ he pointed out, taking the large envelope in his mouth and trying to ignore the dry, bitter, ashy taste. _I’m just as likely to be the elder here as you are. So I’m invoking those odds and claiming older brother status in this._

He dropped the envelope on the coffee table. Rosa stared at it.

_Go on. Open it._

They both looked at the envelope for a few moments.

“It feels weird to do this with someone around.”

 _Pretend you’re alone_ , he suggested. Rosa gave him an unimpressed look from across the table.

 _I’ll be really quiet,_ he promised. _You won’t even know I’m here._

“It’s kind of hard to ignore the seventy-kilo snake in the room,” Rosa said, smiling despite herself.

Clem coiled up again, pulling himself in to be as small as possible. His golden eyes reflected out of the darkness at her. She fought a laugh and shook her head fondly.

 _It will be easier with a friend here,_ he said softly. _Go on._

Rosa looked back at the envelope. She pressed her lips together, then reached for it.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is a quotation from Nietzsche. Here's a different translation, and the sentence that follows it:
> 
>  _“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”_  
>  (Nietzsche, _The Dawn of Day_ )
> 
> I felt it reflected Rosa's self-imposed containment, and Clem's absolutely correct perception that she needs someone to support the emotional weight of her commitment--not the actual commitment, just the knowledge that it exists. Even though it scares the daylights out of him, he listens to her reasons, and allows his mind to be changed about her decision. Rosa would never ask for help, of course; she'd consider it a weakness. But we all know how good Clem is at intuiting things, and how he is drawn to helping others. (Someone has inherited Father's acts of service trait...)


	5. THE FIRST JOB

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, lookie here, another chapter so close to the last one! Warnings for self-destructive behavior and nightmares.

Junior hadn’t been sleeping well.

It was no wonder, really, given that his dreams were either legitimate Hastur rehashes or his own brain turning the situation worse, but all in all, the past few days had been awful. No focus in his classes, no enthusiasm for his new friends—he felt like a shambling shell of his usual self. That was probably the point.

The guy’s name was Brady Willard. He dozed during maths class and rode his skateboard around campus. Junior had exactly zero information outside of that. He didn’t seem like his soul was ripe for Hell. Why did Hastur want Junior to kill him? Junior glowered into the middle distance on his bench, keeping Willard in sight but careful not to make eye contact. Not that they really could, shades and all, but Junior often forgot such things.

His eye…or Willard’s life. His eye, one he used and was pretty attached to in every sense…or some stranger he didn’t even know. The pain and horror of Hastur digging his eyeball from its socket, or one more pothead skater douche. Who probably had a family and a dog and little siblings he bought ice cream for on Saturdays.

Junior sucked in a deep breath. He let it go as slowly as he could, trying not to shake.

A squeal of tires, a shout, and a crash.

Junior’s head shot up and his body went numb. That wasn’t—he hadn’t—was it? Surely he didn’t—

A crowd was already gathering, shouts for help interspersed with people on cell phones filming the whole thing. A premed student barking orders. And soon, sirens. Junior watched it all with shaking hands and blood pounding in his ears.

“Not bad,” a gravelly voice said beside him, and Junior smelled the rot-and-tobacco of Hastur before he could even stomach glancing at him. Hastur wore a stringy blond wig and carried a filthy cigarette, lounging on the bench like he’d been there all along. Junior tried to speak but couldn’t.

They watched in silence as the ambulance arrived, and then Junior stood, torn between wanting a closer look and running away.

“Not a clean kill, but not a total wash,” Hastur said, tapping ash from his cigarette directly down his front. “Might pull through. Might not. Either way, potential for an open vessel.”

“Is…what?” Junior said blankly.

“Just means he’s weak,” Hastur grunted. “Reckon I could shove some low-ranking imp in him during surgery. Whether or not he lives, that’s a body for some serious troublemaking prepped and ready. Potential to tarnish that stupid little soul in there. Well done, you.”

Junior sunk to his knees. He thought he was going to be sick.

“It…wasn’t me,” he heard himself say. “I didn’t—I couldn’t—”

“Hope for your sake you can and did,” Hastur said, standing and grinning at him around his cigarette butt. “Either way, my quota’s met. I’ll see you soon, little Crowley.”

Junior sat on the pavement for a long moment after Hastur left. The ambulance pulled away. Then Junior stood up and staggered to his flat. There was a whole bottle of tequila on top of the fridge, something imported that one of his flatmates was saving. Junior took it, and the rest of the six-pack from the fridge, and closed himself in his room. The tequila had him coughing and sputtering on the first pull, but by the third he powered through the pain to chug the whole thing. Then he shotgunned two of the remaining beers, forcing them down and maybe turning them into something else, something a little stronger, and sometime around choking down the third can he blacked out a little—or a lot—

The important bit is that he woke up in the school greenhouse with a pounding headache sometime later, his arm wrapped around a flowerpot half-full with dirt and the contents of his stomach, and his phone in his sweatpants’ pocket. Junior blinked blearily as he pulled it out and checked the time. It was the middle of the night, and he had three missed calls from Azirafather. Not enough battery or signal to call him back.

Junior rolled over, pressed his face to the dirt floor, and shuddered, not exactly crying but not not-crying, either.

He slid into his snake form because historically that had always made things easier, curled up under a massive rhododendron, and went back to sleep.

.

Junior woke up and slithered most of the way home before dawn. He made a brief stop at a twenty-four-hour liquor store near campus, concentrated on a small miracle, and hoped it would do as an apology to his flatmates. He snuck back into the flat, replaced the bottle on the top of the fridge, and tiptoed to the shower. He sat under the boiling spray until it turned cold. Then he got out and checked his phone, charging on the bathroom counter.

Text from Angelica: _Wake up nerd, I’m taking you for breakfast. Be in the parking lot by 7 or I’m coming up_.

Junior’s mouth twitched and it felt like it was happening to someone else’s mouth. Well. The last thing he needed was for anyone in the flat to find out he had attractive and available siblings (in previous conversations, Junior had made it known that yes, he did have many siblings, yes they were all adults, no he was not introducing anyone, unless they really liked pythons. Or vipers, in his sisters’ cases). Might as well meet her demands. Food sounded kinda good.

“Woah,” Angelica said when Junior came down, and Junior smiled weakly. Angelica looked very much like a more independent life was suiting her, from her messy braid to her sneakers, exuding confidence and stability like some kind of uni cryptid. Junior was just in different sweats and knew his face was still pale and dark-circled under the eyes. Well. All things considered, he probably looked a sight better than he had the night before. “You look exhausted. You could’ve told me to bugger off and I would’ve listened.”

“’m fine,” Junior croaked, and winced, clearing his throat. “Fine,” he tried again. “Classes. You know how it is.”

“Right, yeah, classes,” Angelica said, and put her arm around him (he had long outgrown her being able to get her arm around his shoulders, but the waist wasn’t so bad). “Come on, let’s get some food.”

Thanks to Azirafather, they had over a dozen favorite breakfast places in London, and Angelica chose a bakery nearby that had cinnamon rolls the size of Junior’s head. He accordingly picked one out and some strong black coffee. The smell reminded him of Father and his stomach unexpectedly lurched, twisting inside of him painfully tight.

“On second thought,” Junior grimaced, “maybe I’ll…tea.”

Angelica looked at him over the rim of her shades and narrowed her eyes, but nodded, taking his coffee and sipping it. “Alright. Hang tight, I’ll get it.”

Junior picked at his food and was relieved to find that the tea she brought back triggered no sense memories.

“How, um…how are classes?” he ventured.

“Going really well, I think,” Angelica nodded, and launched into a dissertation about her classes and the professors she liked and professors she hated, and the jerk who tried to tease her about her height in the gym who found himself trapped under a weightlifting bar that weighed thirty pounds more than it had before. Junior nodded and hummed in the appropriate places, sliding out of active listening and feeling content to just let her talk for a while.

“—listening to me?”

“Yes,” Junior said automatically, looking up from his destroyed cinnamon roll. Angelica glared at him.

“You just nodded when I said I left an orgy early to come get you,” Angelica said, and Junior snorted. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Junior huffed. “Just…sleep. Bad dreams.” Angelica’s entire body stiffened, and he winced. “No, not like…I mean…listen.” He put his fork down and crossed his arms. “Have you ever…”

“Have I ever what?” Angelica asked warily.

“It’s…I don’t know. It’s stupid.” Junior slouched in his chair.

“I don’t think it is,” Angelica shook her head. “Tell me.”

Junior blinked rapidly and took a deep breath. “Have you ever…done a miracle without meaning to?”

“All the time,” Angelica nodded. “Stress and fight-or-flight’s how I usually do mine. Not like R—other people. Didn’t think it worked that way for you, though.”

“Hasn’t. Doesn’t. I. It.” Junior rubbed his face vigorously. “I dunno. Stupid. Just having trouble sleeping, is all.”

“Bit different, being far away from home, isn’t it?” Angelica said gently, and Junior nodded, hoping for once his shades were as opaque as he needed them to be. “You’re always welcome to kip over at mine, you know that.”

“Bit far from campus,” Junior said, and popped a shred of cinnamon roll in his mouth. “I…thanks. For this. Needed it.”

“I can tell,” Angelica said, and pushed his plate towards him. “Eat. It’ll help.”

Angelica bullied him into taking a rather large, fluffy blueberry muffin to go before they left and Junior managed to get up the mental bandwidth to tease her some about how fussy she was being over him, which seemed to make her feel a little better. Or at least less nervous, concerning him. Junior hoped so, anyway. They parted ways outside of his flat and she took off for class while Junior sloughed up to his room and collapsed on his bed. He wrinkled his nose—sheets smelled sour—but didn’t fight his exhaustion.

_—through the streets, slipping through the crowd, keeping an eye on his target, a young man, until the right moment—why should they keep their wealth, he murmured into the young man’s ear, what right do they have to feast while your sisters starve—looking down at a stabbed body as the young man ran off with a bulging purse of gold and it’s Brady Willard staring sightless up at the sky, body crumpled like he encountered a large vehicle instead of a knife—down at his hands and it’s him, he’s holding the knife, his hands are covered in blood and it’s the same color as his hair hanging in curls around his shoulders—Crowley, report in—Anthony, what have you done—_

Junior clawed himself to consciousness and spent a very long time trying not to scream.

.

“Angel, stop fretting,” Crowley mumbled into his coffee cup as Aziraphale fiddled around in the kitchen, straightening things that didn’t really need it and walking in a manner that could be called pacing, but wasn’t pacing, because Aziraphale didn’t pace, thank you very much. “Nothing’s wrong, the kids are all fine.”

“I know that, I’m not _fretting_ ,” Aziraphale snipped, taking the lid off the butter dish and replacing it and then moving the whole dish two inches to the right. “It’s just—Junior always calls back, and he hasn’t, and I…” Aziraphale wove his fingers together, fidgeting with the rings stacked on his left hand (the winged wedding band and the lovely anniversary band with all the children’s eye colors picked out in precious gems). “I’m not fretting, I just have a feeling, is all.”

Crowley drained his coffee cup and stood up, walking his mug to the sink with languorous ease and then casually cornering Aziraphale against the counter, taking Aziraphale’s face in his hands.

“It’s alright to fret, angel,” Crowley said gently. “You’re not used to the kids being gone, you have no idea what they’re up to—s’alright to be a bit worried. But I promise, they’re fine, Junior’s fine. Having the time of his life right now, meeting new people and staying out all hours and forgetting to check his phone. He’ll call when he gets a minute, always has done.”

Aziraphale sighed and nodded and tried to smile. “I know, you’re right. Of course you’re right. But—”

“No buts,” Crowley admonished. “We’re not going to be helicopter parents, we already promised.” Crowley brought Aziraphale’s face closer to kiss his forehead. Aziraphale melted a little into the contact. “Still some cream puffs from last night in the fridge. Might settle your nerves a bit.”

“Alright,” Aziraphale relented. He let Crowley feed him several cream puffs, their latest foray into baking, but no matter what he did, Aziraphale couldn’t shake the niggling feeling in his chest that something somewhere had gone terribly, terribly Wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just some programming notes: there probably won't be an update for a few weeks while Olwen and I figure out how we want this plotty bit to go; once we have that figured out and written, we'll be sure to wrap the story part up nice and neat and then settle into the more loosey-goosey episodic bit. Stay with us, friends, we can promise things will be alright, but it's gonna get dark before it gets better. Take care of yourselves.


	6. To Know Is Nothing at All; To Imagine Is Everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rosa has received another assignment, and is concerned at its lack of guidance.

“I got a new assignment,” Rosa said. Clem took a deep breath and switched the phone to his other ear.

“Up or down?”

“Up.”

"Mm-hm.” He looked around to make sure Azirafather was out of earshot. “Big?”

“No. Still tiny.”

“Do you… want me to come up?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s a long trek, and it’s not like—”

“I can ask Tura, or I can take the train.”

“You’d have to be people-shaped for the train, and that means maneuvering the chair, and you—”

“Tura,” he said, raising his voice and leaning away from the phone. “Are you available to run me to the city tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow? Sure,” Datura called back from the kitchen. “How long’ll you be there?”

“A few days? I want to hang out with Rosa for a bit.”

“No problem."

“I’ll be there tomorrow,” he said to Rosa. She sighed.

“It’s completely unnecessary, Clem.”

“Yep. I just fancy an outing to the National Portrait Gallery. You’re going to take me.”

“Fine.” He heard the smile in her voice. “I love you.”

“Of course,” he said. “I am terribly loveable.”

  
  


Driving with Datura meant that he could be a pile of snake in the passenger seat, infinitely preferable to being people-shaped on a crowded train.

Datura stayed long enough for a cup of tea and a hug from Rosa, but went home that evening. They had a session scheduled with the local fix-it shop in the next town, where they volunteered one day a week, learning the business with the elderly man who had been running it since who knew when. Crowley had argued that Datura should be paid, but Datura had explained that they simply enjoyed the work, and it was a relaxing way to pass the time, and besides, it meant they got to keep an eye on the elderly gentleman, about whom they worried off and on. Azirafather had said nothing, but looked very proud.

 _Well?_ Clem said, stretching out along the back of the settee. _What is it about this one that has you uncomfortable?_

Rosa sat back in Azirafather’s worn armchair and sighed.

“It’s so odd. It’s just an appearance at a wine and cheese.”

_What, no actual directive? Just… go?_

Rosa nodded.

_So… it’s your presence that is the assignment?_

“It seems like it.” She shook her head. “I can’t help being suspicious. Is that odd?”

 _Uh, no. No, it’s not at all._ Clem shook his head back at her.

“I know I’m not privy to the whys or the motivation behind these decisions, but when my only instruction is to be somewhere…”

_I can see why you’re uncomfortable. It’s like going in blind. When is it?_

“Tomorrow night. It’s at a gallery. A vernissage or something. I looked it up.”

_What are you going to wear?_

Rosa gave him a look.

“I’m worried about the underlying meaning of a suspicious assignment, and you want to know how I intend to dress?”

_Well, see, I know you, and you’re going to spend hours planning your outfit, because you never just throw something on. You design your ensembles according to how you want to behave or cope with the occasion._

“I am slightly disturbed that you have observed this and intuited something I have barely consciously admitted to myself.”

Clem shrugged by shifting his coils.

_You like clothes. I thought it would help you relax if we talked about it and you chose your outfit to feel more secure._

“Stop being insightful.” Rosa crossed her arms.

_No instructions on how to arrive or how long to spend or who to talk to?_

“Nothing. It’s so odd.” Rosa ran her fingers along the hem of her sweater absently. “Both sides usually give me precise, detailed plans of what to achieve. Not having that is so disconcerting.”

 _Well, I’m here now_ , Clem said cheerfully. _I don’t suppose the reception is at the National Portrait Gallery and your invitation covers a plus one?_

“You’re ridiculous.” Rosa laughed. “I’d never take you with me on a job. The point was—”

 _To keep the rest of us out of it all forever, I know, I know._ Clem stuck his tongue out at her. _Well, you can’t keep me from staying up and waiting for you._

“It will be nice to have someone here when I get back,” Rosa admitted.

_I imagine you get lost in thinking about a job, and worry at it for days._

“I wouldn’t say—”

_Rosa, you live in your head so much, and you overthink everything. And this is serious enough that you wouldn’t be able to shake it for a while._

“I really don’t like how insightful you are about my psyche,” Rosa said, regarding him through narrowed eyes. “Have you considered going into psychology?”

 _Stop trying to redirect me_ , Clem said placidly. _I’ll think about it. We’re talking about you and your tendency to overthink. I’ll distract you, okay?_

Rosa sighed and looked up at the ceiling.

“Fine.”

 _I wasn’t asking._ Clem slipped off the back of the settee and burrowed under the throw pillows, peeking out at her. She rolled her eyes at him.

 _So,_ he said. _What will you wear?_

  
  
  


“I’m home,” Rosa said, unnecessarily since Clem had heard her approach the shop. She closed the door and turned the locks, then slipped off her white coat, hanging it on the coat tree.

 _How was your party?_ Clem asked from the depths of the dim shop. A single light shone in the study. She moved toward it.

“Fine? No one was boorish, the art wasn’t obnoxious, the wine was palatable, there were little Gruyère tart things?” She shrugged and fell onto the settee. Clem snapped at her half-heartedly, and she pushed at his pile of coils to give her more room.

_Gruyère tarts? And you didn’t bring any home for me?_

“It is incredibly gauche to start stuffing cheese tarts into one’s handbag,” Rosa said, lowering her head to stare Clem right in the eyes. He moved forward suddenly and booped her nose with his snout. She fell back, laughing. Clem smugly rearranged himself in the corner of the settee.

Rosa reached down and slipped off her white pumps, wriggling her toes with a sigh.

_What do you think the goal was, now that you’ve been there?_

“I still have no idea,” Rosa admitted, loosening the white silk scarf she had tied around her neck. “And not knowing makes me feel adrift. I don’t like being a pawn, and that’s exactly what this has been like. Go here, be there, leave.”

 _Just be in the right place at the right time for something else to happen to someone not you._

“I guess.” Rosa yawned.

_Meet anyone interesting?_

“No such luck. The artist was there; I shook his hand, he wasn’t pretentious. Weirdly tall. A bunch of snobby city people. I did a lot of smiling and nodding.” She started pulling pins from her pale hair and undoing the high coils. “It’s over. My report will be ‘Nothing notable to speak of. Good charcuterie. Wine was pedestrian.’” She poured the hairpins onto the end table from the palm of one hand, gently shaking her fingers through her hair with the other. “Three days of anxiety and trying to puzzle out the undercurrents for nothing.” She glanced over at him. “It’s been nice having your company, though.”

_Well, you’ve got me for another couple of days. Gallery tomorrow?_

“Absolutely,” she said, smiling at him. He took a moment to appreciate how much more relaxed she seemed than when she'd been fussing with her layers of white lace skirts and chiffon blouse before she had left. “I’ll even take you for a Portrait Afternoon Tea at the restaurant. Azirafather would be dreadfully disappointed if you went home and hadn’t had a glass of Prosecco.”

 _We can order the Prosecco, but you can drink mine,_ Clem said. _Alcohol isn’t my thing. And I think you deserve it after tonight._

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title is an Anatole France quotation.
> 
> You know, Clem and Rosa is a pairing I hadn't expected to happen, but I really like how it works. They're good for one another.


	7. HOLIDAY BLUES

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another Junior chapter and it's getting darker, my friends; more gore mentions and a lot of Sad Son Hours.

Despite everything—or maybe because of everything—going home felt like healing, somehow. Junior didn’t really get how the wards worked, but he could feel some part of himself unclench the second he crossed the property line behind his siblings. Not relaxing all the way, but at least not wound tight enough to break at the barest application of pressure.

Azirafather was waiting at the door for them all, and took his turn pulling Junior into a bone-crushing hug, which Junior felt too weak to reciprocate in full but nevertheless appreciated. “Hello, my boy,” Azirafather whispered, and kissed his cheek. “There’s lunch, if you’re hungry.”

“Starved,” Junior grunted, hoping his smile wasn’t as wooden as it felt. Azirafather seemed to notice anyway, holding Junior’s face in his palms and looking him over.

“You look exhausted,” Azirafather said, the pad of his thumb brushing one of the eye-bags Junior had been sporting for quite a while now. Junior flinched out of his grip, fighting nausea.

“M’fine,” he grunted, shoving his hands in his hoodie pocket and trying to smile but feeling it not land.

“Alright,” Azirafather said after a long moment of bewildered silence, tucking his hands together and stepping aside to let Junior into the house. Junior sighed despite himself and felt his shoulders relax as soon as he was inside the house proper. The smells of stew and fresh-baked bread, while maybe not as tantalizing as they would have been if Junior had been sleeping alright, were still a heady draw. He heard Angelica talking at high speeds about something to the room at large as he wandered into the kitchen, resolving to get his duffle bag out of the Sprite’s boot after he’d eaten something.

Angelica was sitting on the counter, illustrating something about sports therapy department drama with a hunk of bread, while Clem sat in great coils along the kitchen climbing tree and Datura giggled nearby. Rosa was nowhere to be seen, but Junior felt his throat immediately close up as he took in Father, leaning against the kitchen sink and grinning widely, eyes uncovered and hair loose around his shoulders. It took a moment for Father to glance over and see Junior, rooted to the spot and trying not to be sick all over again.

“There you are, squirt, thought you might’ve forgot where we lived,” Father said teasingly, opening his arms, and Junior mechanically walked into them before he could overthink it or do something mad like run away. He hugged Father with a quick squeeze and let go, backing away from him and giving what he hoped dearly, but did not truly believe, was a normal smile.

“M’here,” Junior said, and diverted to the food. He piled up far more than he felt capable of eating into a bowl, then took his bounty to the table, where no one was sitting and where he could still hear the commotion in the kitchen without having to be a great part of it. He ate without tasting what he was putting in his mouth, and when he looked down at over half a bowl of stew and realized if he ate more he would be sick, decided it was easier to just leave the bowl than try and explain himself to anyone and slipped away upstairs. Maybe he could catch a nap.

By some blessed and probably literal miracle, Junior slept hard for the better part of the day, waking up feeling better than he had in months. He padded down the stairs to find the family finishing off decorating the tree, all of his old ornaments already set aside for him in a pile and Father watching the spectacle from the couch with a glass of wine as Azirafather and Rosa bickered good-naturedly about the aesthetics of ornament placement. Angelica was also sitting on the couch and looked absorbed in her phone. Junior sat between Father and Angelica and picked up one of his old ornaments he’d made when the girls brought home a craft from school, a reindeer made from twigs and paint.

“Sleep well?” Father asked lightly, and Junior nodded, turning over the twig reindeer. “What’s been going on with you, then? We hardly hear from you these days.”

“Just busy,” Junior said.

“Doing what?” Father asked. An unexpected flare of irritation bloomed in Junior’s gut.

“Stuff,” Junior replied, putting the reindeer down and sinking into the couch. He could feel Father looking at him over the rim of the glass and did his best to burrow into the cushions without making it obvious that’s what he was doing.

“Snifter in the kitchen if you’re up for it,” Father said after a long moment. Junior nodded but didn’t move. The air between them curdled and solidified and Junior hated every second of it.

“Junior, dearest, can you get the tree topper? You’re tallest,” Azirafather said sometime later, and Junior heaved himself up from the couch and swiped the tree topper from its place on top of its storage bin. The old doll sculpture the girls had made so long ago had a place of honor elsewhere; their current tree topper was a finer-sculpted angel holding a snake that Junior had made a few years ago. He looked at it in his hands for a moment, and felt the inexplicable urge to crush it. His fingers shook.

Junior instead forced himself to be careful, to plug the topper in and arrange it on the highest bough just so, and then retreated to the love seat, where Clem was draped. Clem shifted a coil to lie across Junior’s shoulders and Junior would never admit it, but the weight and solid comfort of it felt amazing.

 _Glad you’re home,_ Clem said quietly, and Junior let his head fall back against Clem’s thick body and sighed.

“Glad to be home,” he said, and it wasn’t in the slightest a lie or deflection.

Junior thought he would make it through the holidays without incident, and he very nearly did. There were other things to draw attention to, like how Rosa and Angelica were not speaking, though still being polite when forced to occupy the same space for longer than a few minutes at a time, or like Datura’s modifications to their Sprite, which was now sporting antlers and a red nose (Father had threatened violent dismemberment should the Bentley receive the same treatment; Junior was mildly concerned that he didn’t have the energy to even string lights across the old girl’s hood just to rile Father up). There was still the making of gingerbread and the viewing of the “unbirthday play” Father had filmed their second Christmas as a family. They had missed the opportunity to celebrate Chanukkah together this year but there was still the Yule Log and their own small version of Saturnalia that had been concocted sometime around their early teen years, when Junior had gotten the bright idea to do the cooking and cleaning for the day under the guise of being able to boss Father and Azirafather around in the spirit of role reversal.

They were all sitting around in a post-Christmas malaise on Boxing Day before anything truly bad happened.

It started so small—Rosa asked Angelica to pass the television remote.

“Why?” Angelica asked. “We’re watching something already.”

“It’s the credits,” Rosa pointed out. “Nobody’s really watching this, anyway, I just want to see—”

“Oh, so suddenly we all have to do what you think is best now,” Angelica said, and the spirit in the room changed immediately from comfortable to charged. Junior shifted, staring at his knees.

“It’s not what I think is best, it’s common sense,” Rosa frowned. “The movie’s done, the credits are rolling, and some drivel none of us like is up next, I was just going to see what else is on.”

“Maybe it’s fine and you don’t have to see,” Angelica said. “You don’t know everything. I might like what’s next.”

“You like The Real Housewives of Cheshire reruns?” Rosa raised an eyebrow.

“No,” Angelica scowled, “but it’s not your decision to make for all of us, is it?”

“If it’s that big a deal, I’ll take the remote,” Datura said, only to be ignored as Rosa stood up.

“Fine,” Rosa said smoothly, “next time, I’ll just let you watch the drivel, shall I?”

“Spawn, come on, it’s not that big a deal,” Father said, hefting the remote himself. “Let’s see if we can’t find something fun. Oh, how about that one comedy show about the middle ages, what’s it called…angel, do you recall?”

“I think I’ll go catch up on my reading, actually,” Rosa said, making for the stairs.

“That’s fine, turn your back on us during family time, that’s great,” Angelica said loudly, and Rosa froze, her back to the rest of them. Junior frowned harder and sat up, looking at Angelica, who had a sneer on her face.

“Angelica, that’s quite enough,” Azirafather said, and Rosa’s shoulders slumped.

“I don’t think it’s me doing the back-turning, Angelica,” Rosa said softly, and went upstairs.

“What the heaven was that about?” Father said. “Spitfire?”

“Nothing,” Angelica mumbled. “Turn on Golden Girls or whatever, we can all agree on that, at least.”

Father obliged, and Junior settled back into quiet contentment. They watched most of an episode before Father laughed.

“I’m so glad I can watch this without having to worry about Hell’s ugly mugs popping up in the middle of it,” Father said, his hand resting on Azirafather’s knee. Ice dropped down Junior’s spine.

“What?” he said roughly.

“Hell used to hijack all sorts of things to give me my jobs,” Father said.

“I believe the radio and the television were great favorites of theirs, were they not?” Azirafather said. Junior swallowed hard. Hastur hadn’t done that to him yet, but…but if that was usual practice…

Junior stood up and started gathering the dishes around the room in his hands, hoping he could cover up the shaking by staying in motion. Father handed over his mug still half-full of cocoa with a distracted smile.

“Thanks, son,” he said, settling against Azirafather’s side more fully without having to worry about balancing a mug he hadn’t been drinking from for a while. “Very good of you.”

Junior made it to the sink and managed to get the dishes in it before his legs gave out. He snaked out and curled up in the cabinet under the sink, where it was dark and warm and he could have a come-apart in peace. _Good_. He wasn’t _good_. Hastur wouldn’t be bothering with him if he was. Brady Willard would still be in school, if he was good, he wouldn’t be in a medical-induced coma because rumor had it that he woke up during surgery and sliced a doctor open with a scalpel. Hastur had laughed about it for weeks.

Junior had no concept of how long he stayed under the sink, curled in a knot of misery, but when the cabinet door opened he buried his head under his coils, hissing.

“There’s better places to take a nap, kiddo,” Father said, amused. Junior didn’t move, because there was an urge rising in him to _bite_. He wanted to so badly his fangs ached. He felt the blood pumping through his serpent body, impossibly hard and fast for this form. _Give in_ , Hastur whispered in his head, _just do it, little Crowley, it’s just a little blood—_

Something touched him.

Junior struck out without thinking, teeth sinking deep into flesh, powerful jaws latching down, and it didn’t occur to him until he felt Father’s choked-off screams echoing through his skull that he shouldn’t have done that, he shouldn’t—he tried to wriggle away and felt the ripping give of a throat in his jaws, and he couldn’t blink but it sure felt like a blink later he was looking down at Father’s eviscerated corpse, yellow eyes glazed and unblinking, mouth frozen open in surprise, while Junior swallowed down the flesh in his mouth, but it wasn’t Father’s body sprawled on the floor pooling blood anymore, it was _him_ —

Junior startled awake for real and was disoriented to realize he wasn’t under the sink, he was in his room. He must’ve been carried there. Junior stared around him and didn’t move, afraid that if he did, something else would change outside of his control. Who would he hurt next? Azirafather? One of his siblings? Father again? His stomach felt leaden and heavy, like he’d swallowed a rock. It hurt.

After what felt like forever, Junior shifted back to his more human form and buried his face in his hands, shaking. He wasn’t good. He wasn’t. He couldn’t be. Not anymore.

“Spawn? Dinner’s almost—”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Junior snarled as Father poked his head into his room, and Father blinked at him.

“I…okay?” Father frowned at him. “Junior, are you—”

“Would you just go already?” Junior snapped. He hated this. He hated looking at Father’s face and seeing a reel of temptations behind his eyelids. He hated looking at Father and seeing himself, what he was becoming, what he could have been. He wanted to sleep. He wanted to _sleep_.

Father looked at him for a long moment, during which Junior breathed heavily and probably looked more than a little deranged. “Alright,” Father said quietly. “Alright. If…if you’re hungry, there’s. Food. Downstairs.” He withdrew quietly and somehow that was worse than if Father had just yelled at him and slammed the door. Junior curled up on his bed and bit down hard on a pillow, willing himself not to cry.

Needless to say, he lost that battle.

.

“I think the kids need a vacation from their vacation,” Crowley sighed, holding Aziraphale tight and enjoying some skin-to-skin contact. After whatever had come over Junior this evening, he was feeling…not fragile, demons weren’t fragile, but rattled.

“You noticed that too, hmm?” Aziraphale sighed, his hands tracing idle patterns into Crowley’s back. “The girls have had their fights in the past, of course, but this holiday has been a little…tense.”

“Junior’s a wreck,” Crowley said. Aziraphale grunted in agreement. “Figured adjusting to adult life would be a little difficult for them, but…”

“They’ll…I’m sure they’ll find their feet soon enough,” Aziraphale said. They were silent for a moment, and then Aziraphale coughed. Crowley waited patiently for him to voice his thought. “Perhaps…some time together outside of the house would do us some good? After all, that one summer by the beach went very agreeably, do you remember?”

“Was loads of fun,” Crowley nodded. “Been ages since we’ve been anywhere as a family. What are you thinking?”

“Paris,” Aziraphale said, and Crowley was glad for their closeness, as it allowed him to bury his smile against Aziraphale’s shoulder rather than face him. “It has been some time since we’ve been there, and taking the children to see the sights…”

“Get some proper champagne for once,” Crowley nodded.

“And cheese,” Aziraphale sighed. Crowley laughed.

“Plan the itinerary and we’ll make it happen,” Crowley said, and threw his leg more securely over Aziraphale’s hip. “Would be a nice break for whatever nonsense the kids’re being put through.”

Aziraphale hummed in agreement. Crowley resolved to let his worries drift away for the night. A holiday in Paris would be lovely. Hopefully by then the kids would be either up for talking out what was bothering them, or the danger would be past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, Paris. Lovely in the spring. Should be a fun family vacation, right?


	8. Round and Round: April In Paris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A spring trip to Paris turns sour for the Fell-Crowley family... with significant consequences.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hail, devoted readers! Quilly and I have gone a step further than our usual taking turns chapter by chapter, and now we're writing all this together. (Have fun figuring out who wrote what scenes, if you like. It may offer you a break from the stress.) 
> 
> Round and Round is a multi-chapter story within The New Arrangement series. Each chapter will be tagged as Round and Round in the title to help you keep track. We're planning a Tuesday/ Friday publishing schedule again till this arc wraps up.
> 
> CW: Really bad family fights, BAMF Aziraphale, dark side, physical violence, alcohol and tobacco, and everything previously tagged. Look, our snabies are in a bad place, okay? (It will be okay in the end, I promise.)
> 
> The plot's come a-calling, Wiggleverse peeps. Hang on for the ride.

_Round and round they went with their snakes, snakily…_

_-Aldous Huxley_

Earth was neutral ground and always had been, which was terribly convenient if you were an Archangel and a Lord of Hell in need of a rendezvous point to discuss your mutual protégé.

Michael had ordered something called an iced caramel macchiato, which was delightfully sweet and rich. She watched as Dagon drank something that looked like dishwater and smelled like tuna salad leavings, which she had bared her teeth and called a “secret menu item” when Michael raised her eyebrow at it.

“Overall, she’s doing much better than I could have expected,” Michael said idly, swirling her drink with her straw. “Given who her progenitors are, I mean.”

“Her paperwork’s certainly a sight more readable,” Dagon nodded. “Been a nice little diversion, all things considered.”

“I’m thinking of giving her more responsibilities,” Michael said, and Dagon raised her eyebrows. “Seeing what she does with a minor manifestation, for example.”

“Been a while since Heaven employed anything like that,” Dagon said. “Feeling a little Old Testament, are we?”

“Oh, it’s been ages since we had any fun, why not?” Michael said, the barest edge of a smile playing in the corner of her mouth. Dagon snorted tuna water up her nose laughing.

“Well, tit for tat, then,” Dagon leered. “Suppose I’ll give her a higher-profile job, myself. Maybe a corruption or a mild plague. Swine flu was enormous fun, maybe a repeat of that.”

Michael sipped her macchiato and smiled thinly.

“So.” Dagon wiped her nose. “Tell the other fusswings, yet?”

“No,” Michael shook her head. “Seems to me that this is a need-to-know sort of thing. Why, have you told the other lower-downs?”

“Told Beelzebub,” Dagon shrugged. “Don’t think ze was listening.” She shivered. “On the phone with zir pigeon.”

Michael let a delicate shiver run through her. Gabriel had certainly been talking enthusiastically about something to someone in his office earlier, and judging by Sandalphon’s sulking, it wasn’t to him. That strange camaraderie was certainly not worth dwelling on.

“At any rate,” Michael said, “I thought I should let you know my intentions, in the interest of balance.”

“Noted,” Dagon said, and slurped her abomination. “Same time next week?”

Michael saw no problem with this and nodded.

  
  


_If you don't tell them,_ Rosa told herself, _someone else will._

It was the first time they’d all been together since Christmas break. It was perhaps only the fourth time she and Angelica had been together since her sister had walked out of the café, and it was going to be for more than just a couple of minutes this time. At home, they could stay out of one another’s way; on holiday, it would be much more difficult. Rosa didn't begrudge Angelica her feelings, but it didn’t make it any easier.

At least Clem would be in her corner. He had come up to London on his own once more after that odd Heaven assignment, when Hell had sent an assignment for Valentine’s Day. Despite her initial reluctance to share the information with anyone, she was grateful for his quiet strength, and for the oddly lighter sense of responsibility. It was an illusion, but having someone else know about it and not judging her was a relief.

_I’ll tell them. Just… another time._

Datura had picked them all up in the city, and the drive home was strained. Angelica and Anthony sat in the Bentley’s back seat, both with their arms crossed, looking out their respective windows. Rosa sat next to Datura in the front, making polite conversation; Datura knew something was off, and kept glancing in the rear-view mirror at their silent siblings. They darted a sidelong glance at Rosa after one of these, and she gave them a one-shoulder shrug in reply. Angelica was in all likelihood sulky at having to be in a car with her, but she had no idea what was going on with Anthony, who usually wouldn’t shut up.

  
  


At home, Azirafather came out the front door with open arms to welcome them, and Rosa accepted his embrace with a smile. Azirafather was always cheerful and warm, and with her constant underlying fear of _if he knew_ she was grateful for his unconditional love. Angelica and Anthony were subjected to the same welcome, and Rosa carried her case upstairs, listening to the sounds of Angelica’s laughter and Anthony’s murmured replies to whatever Azirafather was saying.

Dinner was almost like old times, talking over one another, answering questions about school and discussing the upcoming trip to France. They hadn’t done a family holiday in years, but Azirafather had insisted on it for this spring break. “I don’t see all of you nearly enough,” he had said at Christmas, “and I am determined to take you all to Paris this spring. We shall have a lovely time, my dears.”

“Easier than holidays when you all were younger, chasing after you when you got distracted by anything shiny,” Father had muttered, and Azirafather had fluttered at him. Father had followed up with something about chasing shiny things being encoded in angelic genes, and Azirafather had protested at him for the next three hours, well past bedtime, while Father had smirked into a series of glasses of wine.

Crowley had accordingly booked a suite in a Paris hotel for a week in early April, and Azirafather had begun planning, leaving travel books and holiday brochures scattered all over the house in his wake. Rosa had received texts about suggestions for day trips, and the occasional call when Azirafather would discuss the pros and cons of visiting the Bibliothèque Mazarine versus the Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève. (Rosa’s advice in the end was to visit both, of course, a suggestion Azirafather took with enthusiasm and gratitude, as if he would never have thought of it himself.)

  
  


Aziraphale was determined to have the holiday’s pace be relaxed and slow from the very beginning, and so the first stage of the journey was the ferry from Dover to Calais. He leaned happily on the rail, watching the waves. Rosa sat next to Father on a bench, hands folded in her lap and her back straight; Father’s legs were stretched out, his back slouched, arms crossed.

“He’s so happy,” Rosa said fondly.

“He’s been looking forward to this,” Crowley said, his lackadaisical posture at odds with the affection in his voice.

“I have, too,” Rosa said. And she had been looking forward to walking through a new city among glorious old buildings, enjoying art and lovely food. Also, honestly, she really did need a holiday. School was heavy, and, well, her part-time job was an ongoing stress, as rare as the tiny assignments were.

Debarking in Calais was entertaining because Aziraphale kept herding them like ducklings instead of adult beings. Rosa and Datura exchanged amused glances as he fluttered around them, making sure everyone had luggage and knew where they were headed in case they got separated.

They took the train to Paris, another relaxed leg of the journey. Anthony slept fitfully next to her, twitching and mumbling, his muscles tense; the complete opposite of how he had slept as a child, spread out loosely with arms and legs akimbo. When they reached Paris, she gently touched his shoulder, and he jumped awake so abruptly she thought he might have strained muscles doing it. Apparently he was in need of a holiday, as well.

The hotel Crowley had booked was sumptuous, the suite spacious with rooms for everyone, a kitchenette, and two family rooms. One of its features was a main balcony of sweeping stone off one of the main family rooms, and a second smaller one off the master bedroom. They settled in and went out for a delicious dinner, which was accompanied by the proper champagne that Aziraphale had been anticipating.

Monday morning Crowley arrived at the suite with two large boxes of breakfast pastries, and they ate on the large balcony in the morning sun, with pots and pots of tea and coffee. The first morning in Paris had been left free for everyone to wander as they pleased before the family outings began. Rosa and Azirafather chose to go to Shakespeare and Company to run their fingers over the spines of as many books as they could. Rosa made Azirafather pose in the doorway with the “angel in disguise” quotation and took a burst of photos. Then she propped her phone against a stack of books, put the camera timer on, and ran to join him, putting her arm around his waist while he slid his around her shoulder, beaming. They giggled over the pictures together at lunch, and Azirafather impishly told her to send a copy of each to Crowley. She did, laughing as she messaged them to her father. In the afternoon, everyone met at the Louvre to enjoy looking at masterpieces and listening to their fathers reminisce and bicker about the artists.

All in all, it had been a good day, and Rosa went to bed content and feeling loved, as well as feeling loving toward her family. A family holiday in Paris had been an excellent idea.

  
  



	9. Round and Round: Two Days in Paris

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Greetings! Welcome to the Wiggleverse angst train, leaving the station this very chapter!
> 
> Chapter-specific warnings for violence and humiliation, gang, we're starting to get into it. Take care of yourselves.

Tuesday morning, Clem took the elevator downstairs and rolled himself out to the street, visiting the little bistro with tables and chairs outside its doors a block down the road. He wanted fresh air and a little bit of space this morning. He loved his siblings, but having all of them in one place for more than a day or so was unusual now. He wasn’t as used to the personalities and energy bumping together anymore.

He turned down both crepes and a croissant, much to the waiter’s confusion, and just ordered tea and a glass of sparkling water. They’d had a huge meal the evening before, and his system wasn’t used to so much people food. For a moment Clem was tempted to order a soft-boiled egg the way Azirafather used to make them, just for the comfort and familiarity of it, but he didn’t. He was still full. In fact, a nap in the sun sounded like an excellent plan for the day. He’d already scoped out the sunniest room in the suite.

A click of heels on cobblestones grew louder, and he looked up to see Rosa pulling out the bistro chair opposite him, the skirt of her dress blowing in the morning breeze, and a hand on her large hat.

“Sure, Rosa,” he said. “I hadn’t come here to be alone. Please join me.”

“I got an assignment,” she said.

“What, now?” Clem reflexively looked over his shoulder, but of course Azirafather and Father weren’t there. They’d still been asleep when Clem had left. He turned back to Rosa, biting his lip. “This is terrible timing.”

“I know.” Rosa reached out for his glass of sparkling water and sipped from it. He pulled his cup of tea closer to him to protect it. “Clem, it’s here. In Paris. I can't put it off til we get home.” She was tense; he could hear it. 

“What are you going to do? Can you turn it down?”

“No! Clem, that's asking for trouble. If I call out because it’s an inconvenient time, what am I going to do when it’s something really serious that I have to refuse to do?”

“Say no to that, too!”

“Clem, I’ll just go off by myself for an afternoon. I’ll do it, it will be over, it will be fine.”

“I want to go on the record saying that I think this is a terrible idea.” Clem took his glass back from Rosa. “So, is it up, or down?”

“Up.”

Clem drummed his fingers on the arm of his wheelchair. “This doesn’t feel right.”

“None of this feels right,” Rosa said. “But it’s probably because I’m still not really used to it yet.”

Clem looked at her. She was sitting in the bistro chair, elegant sunhat shading her pale skin, stylish sunglasses protecting her eyes under the wide brim. She looked like an Audrey Hepburn character.

“What is it?” she said. Clem shook his head.

“Worried about my little sister, that’s all.”

She smiled and reached forward to put her hand on his. The tension had been covered up so smoothly that if he hadn’t been paying attention, he would have assumed she was over her initial surprise and everything was okay.

“I’m fine. I promise. I want to get this over with as quickly as possible, though.”

“What, today?”

“Today.”

“Rosa—”

“I don’t want to interfere with this trip any more than I have to. I’ll do it today, get it over with, and we’ll have the rest of the week to enjoy ourselves. It’ll be quiet. No one will know. And we’ll all be fine.”

Clem looked at her. She frowned.

“Stop giving me that look.”

“ _ Mademoiselle? _ ” said the waiter, pausing by the table.

“ _ Un café au lait, s’il vous plait _ ,” she said, smiling up at him. It was like she hadn’t even had the moment of anxiety. Clem sighed.

  
  


An hour later, back in the suite, the rest of the family was having breakfast on the balcony, discussing the day’s plans.

“I think I’m going to head to the Tuileries today on my own, actually,” Rosa said, pouring herself a cup of tea.

“What?” said Aziraphale. “But, darling, today was going to be—”

“I know,” Rosa said, smiling at him. “I’m feeling a bit… I think I’d like to take today to be quiet.”

“Darling, we can absolutely switch today’s itinerary with another shorter day on the schedule if—”

“Want company?” Datura offered.

“I’d like to be quiet… on my own,” Rosa clarified.

“Ah,” Crowley said. “Got it.”

“But—” Aziraphale began.

“Angel,” Crowley said. “She wants to be alone. Let her.”

Across the table Angelica snorted. Crowley raised an eyebrow.

“Anything you’d like to share with the rest of us, spitfire?”

“Rosa is very good at doing things on her own,” was all she said. Rosa kept her eyes firmly on her cup of tea.

“Perhaps Rosa is going off to have a liason,” Datura said, spreading jam on a croissant. “Leave her alone, everyone.” When no one reacted to the comment, they sighed and bit sadly into their croissant.

“Junior?” Crowley said, turning to where the tall form of their eldest child stood, leaning on the stone balustrade, staring out over the streets. “Do you have anything to add? Are you weighing in on this?”

“What?” Junior said, looking over his shoulder and blinking. “I’m what?”

“Daydreaming?” Aziraphale said with a smile. Junior’s fists clenched, nails scraping the stone.

“Look, I’m sorry if I’m not behaving up to anyone’s standards. I’m sleeping terribly, all right?”

“Whoa,” Clem said, startled. “Anthony, back off, maybe?”

Junior blinked and focused on his parents. Crowley was looking over the top of his sunglasses at him; Azirafather looked wounded.

“I—sorry. Sorry, Azirafather. I’m…”

“A little on edge?” Crowley said. “Yes. We noticed.”

Clem saw a muscle jump in Junior’s cheek. He seemed to be clenching his jaw.

“It’s fine, dear boy,” Aziraphale said. “No… no harm done. I’m sorry you’re having trouble sleeping. Would you like a blessing tonight? I can make sure that you dream of whatever—”

“ _ No _ ,” Junior said sharply, and ran tense fingers through his already disordered hair. “I don’t need  _ help _ , I need to be left alone.”

He pushed past the table and stalked into the suite. As the outer door slammed shut, Clem flicked a glance at Angelica, who was looking after him, her brow furrowed.

Crowley sighed. “Maybe everyone needs to take the day to themselves. How about it, angel? I’ll take you for a gastronomic tour of the patisseries, no kids cramping our style.”

“Oh. Oh, if you think it—”

Crowley gently took Aziraphale’s hand, stilling it from worrying at the cloth napkin in his lap.

“Yes. You deserve a day of being indulged, and I am in the mood to buy you lashings of cream, butter, and sugar.”

“If you like, my dear,” Aziraphale smiled at Crowley. The smile did not, Clem noticed, reach his eyes.

“Right, you lot.” Crowley threw his own napkin on the table and stood up. “You’re all on your own. Try to not burn Paris to the ground.”

“Understood. We’ll only singe it around the edges.” Datura winked at Angelica, who rolled her eyes while fighting a smile.

Clem met Rosa’s eyes and saw her look smug for just a moment before her face cleared. She smiled at him and picked up her cup of tea.

  
  


“Look,” Clem said, wheeling himself into Rosa’s room later that morning. “I want to come with you.”

“Ridiculous. Absolutely not.”

“I don’t have to be  _ with _ you,” he said. “Just nearby.” 

“Clem, no.” She dusted her face with a fluffy brush she’d swirled in some kind of powder. “The rest of you can’t interfere. You know that.”

“I’m not going to interfere,” he said. “I don’t want you doing this one alone.”

“No! Clem, we’re not discussing this.” Rosa picked up a tube of lipstick. “Why are you so clingy?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Breakfast was weird.”

“It was. What’s up with Anthony?” She shook her head, then carefully applied the colour to her lips.

“I’ll shift,” he said. “I’ll shift down. Super small. I’ll hide in your purse.” 

Rosa laughed. “You’re adorable. No.”

Clem crossed his arms and sighed.

“Look, I just have a really bad feeling about today. Today in general. I can’t pin it down, and that makes it worse.”

Rosa stood up and smoothed down her dress.

“Everything will be fine, little brother,” she said, stooping to kiss his cheek. “I’ll see you later.”

She left. Clem looked in the mirror and saw the faint mark of her lips on his cheek.

Maybe everyone taking the day off was a good idea.

  
  


The unease and anger seething just under Junior’s skin was especially restless today and Junior didn’t know why. By all rights he should have been in a good mood—he was in a new city with his family, whom he hadn’t seen for more than a few days at a time for getting close to a year now; he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Hastur for over a month; his bad dreams were still garden-variety (though that didn’t make them any easier to deal with). He stalked Paris trying to clear his head, watching tourists shy away from him and ignoring excitable dogs. Waves of venomous ill-will were peeling off of him like solar flares, and Junior’s aching eyes took it all in—there a flower bouquet wilted as he passed, there a child’s balloon popped too soon. A high heel snapped off in a grate. A man with his wife on his arm noticed a beautiful woman walking past and looked over his shoulder to stare at her. Cabs swerved around absent-minded pedestrians, their drivers swearing out of windows.

At this point it was impossible to tell if Junior was imagining it or if it was real, but did it matter? It all seemed to chalk up to the same thing: vice and sin were following him now and he was leaving them in his wake, exactly like Hastur wanted. The sun was out and Junior was glad for his shades, for his hoodie. The heat was nice but Junior thought if the sun touched his skin he would burst into flames.

He became aware of a dark spot in his awareness. It took a minute, but he recognized it soon enough: ill intent. A violent directive, if he was feeling it right. Junior could feel it tailing him and decided, why not. Why not let this happen, too? He took a detour down an alleyway, dark and shaded from the thoroughfare, and waited. He almost relaxed when he felt the tip of a knife pressing into his back.

“Give me your money,” the man said in heavily-accented English, and Junior smiled, feeling his eyes go lax and his teeth grow sharp. He was going to enjoy this.

  
  


Crowley walked the streets of Paris, following the trail of bad decisions being left like a beacon. Aziraphale was back at the hotel, for once being the one to take a nap while Crowley stayed awake (though, given the sheer volume of pastries Crowley had cajoled him into eating in an attempt to distract them both from their kids’ odd behavior, that wasn’t much of a surprise). Crowley would have curled up next to his husband and slept, himself, but for this nagging feeling that he should follow a mugger through Paris. Crowley lost sight of him for a bit, then felt an energy shift so subtle he would have missed it if he weren’t almost right on top of the alleyway.

Crowley turned down the alley and had about two seconds to process what he was seeing before it hit him: the mugger was here, alright, and so was Junior, bloodied knuckles and cut on his cheek, squeezing the life out of the mugger with an inhuman snarl of a smile across his face. The mugger was choking and making horrible gagging sounds, scrabbling weakly at Junior’s arms, and Crowley did three things in quick order. The first: snapping the mugger away, probably in an unconscious heap outside of a hospital but he wasn’t too fussed about the details. The second: racing to Junior and yanking him to his feet, shaking him hard to try and snap him out of it. The third: grabbing Junior by the wrists and backing him into the wall when Junior snapped at him, looking bestial.

“Anthony!” Crowley barked, and Junior blinked. He was breathing hard, and immediately started shaking. Crowley felt safe enough to let go of his wrists, at least, thumbing the cut on Junior’s cheek and healing it without a thought. Junior’s eyes were still fully yellow, and if Crowley didn’t know any better, he would’ve thought they had a hellish sort of red glow about them. That scared him more than the idea of Junior getting mugged by far. He snapped them to the hotel bathroom and made Junior sit on the edge of the bathtub, trying not to shake, himself. Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong.

Junior began hyperventilating the second he was sitting down, and Crowley wetted down a cloth with warm water to mop up Junior’s face, making soothing sounds. “It’s alright, you’re alright,” he said, over and over, until Junior had at least stopped breathing quite so quickly. “That’s it. Deep breaths, spawn.”

“Where…where issss he?” Junior asked. Crowley’s jaw clenched.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Away.”

“N-need to finish—finish it,” Junior said, and Crowley forced Junior back down, fear and anger licking at his insides like wildfire.

“No,” Crowley said, trying to keep his voice down, aware of Aziraphale asleep in the other room. “You did enough. What were you thinking? You almost killed that human.”

“Desssserved it,” Junior hissed, shaking hands clutching the bathtub so hard his fingers were leaving imprints. “Desssserved to have it happen. Took ssssso many people’sss thingssss. Beat hisssss partner. Hurt otherssss. Belongssss to Hell.”

Crowley’s blood went from fire to ice in an instant.

“Not your decision,” Crowley growled. “Not your decision, not your job. You don’t have  _ any right _ to make calls like that about other people. If he’s going to Hell, he’ll get there without you murdering him in the street, Anthony.”

“Attacked me,” Junior grunted.

“Then there’s other things you do, you  _ know _ this, we’ve been over this a hundred times—you’ve never been violent before, kid, I don’t understand where this is coming from,” Crowley snapped. “You’ve been off for a while but all this trip it’s one thing after another with you.”

Junior looked up at him, eyes still full-yellow and pupils slit wafer-thin, the shadows under his eyes bruised into his skin and face pale and clammy. Crowley’s heart ached, but when he went to smooth some of Junior’s hair out of his face, Junior reeled back and hissed like he’d been struck, standing up and pushing past Crowley towards the bathroom door.

“I don’t need you,” he said savagely. “Leave me  _ alone _ .”

Crowley had two minutes to sit in shocked silence before Aziraphale tore into the bathroom, his eyes wild.

“Crowley, something’s happening, it’s—please, help me find Rosa, something’s wrong—”

Something was definitely wrong, Crowley thought as he followed Aziraphale back out into Paris. He wasn’t so sure this had been a good idea anymore.

  
  


Aziraphale was dreaming.

On the whole, dreaming was an exercise in imagining pleasant nonsense, which Aziraphale could see as being restorative to overactive minds and those for whom sleep was not an option. He himself didn’t mind it much, it being a rather nice way to recharge (and, of course, any excuse at all he could find for cuddling his husband was a plus). When he drifted off after consuming a truly astronomical number of French patisserie offerings, Crowley had been prowling the room, looking for something, and Aziraphale had been too full and warm to stay awake until he crawled into bed. He had full faith Crowley would join him soon enough.

He bounced on a cloud, wriggling in the plush softness, thinking to himself that it was a good thing none of the Renaissance artists who had made the putto popular could see him in his mind’s eye now. What could he say? Loincloths were terribly comfortable.

“Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale shuddered upright, his form shifting suddenly from roundly infantile to roundly adult, though still in the garb of a cupid, and the flush of shame that overtook him spread all the way down to his chest as he stared at his bare toes rather than make eye contact with the Archangel Gabriel, perched on his cloud with shiny patent leather shoes and that stupid scarf over his impeccably-tailored suit.

“Aziraphale, you’re being lazy again,” Gabriel chided. “See, your kid’s out there doing all the work!”

Aziraphale frowned, then looked to where Gabriel was pointing. There was a soft silvery-white glow in the city of Paris spread below his cloud, and the longer Aziraphale stared at it, the more his subconscious—and increasingly his conscious mind, too—began to be aware of the real, tangible aura of that glow. The familiarity of it. The strength of it.

“Rosa,” he said, and in a blink was awake. The glow was still there in the waking world, gently tugging at his awareness, and Aziraphale’s heart thudded in his chest. Why would she need to make such a manifestation of power? Unless— 

“Crowley!” he cried, realizing Crowley wasn’t in the bed with him after all, and leapt upright to go find him.


	10. Round and Round: Paris sous les bombes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It finally happens: The Ineffable Dads find out.
> 
> It does not go well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're sorry, we're sorry. I, Olwen, am especially sorry for this chapter.

Rosa liked things going according to plan. Being in control was a good thing. Planning ahead, accounting for every eventuality and knowing how to handle them if they came up; it was part of her general approach to life, really, and especially so in these assignments.

This, she had not accounted for.

To say that her heart dropped into her stomach wasn’t enough. She somehow felt as if her skin was on fire, while at the same time her core had turned to ice. Behind her, the facade of Notre Dame de Paris rose, still touched with scaffolding from the restoration efforts. Before her was the square of Notre Dame, in which her parents stood, appearing between one moment and the next.

Father looked stunned. He didn’t have his glasses on, which meant that wherever they had come from, it had been quick. He also looked like he was evaluating the situation, holding off for the moment.

Azirafather, on the other hand, was blazing with Heavenly power, the likes of which Rosa had never seen. She had seen him angry; she’d seen him protective. But not… righteous, like this. He was ready to smite something.

For a moment Rosa wanted to drop into snake form, her lithe, dainty snake form, all alabaster scales with opalescent touches. The form Azirafather used to cuddle, used to hold snugly in the curve of his arm while he read.

_They weren’t supposed to know._

But Rosa was performing a job, and she had to finish it. Despite her leaden stomach and seized throat; despite her pain at her parents’ presence.

It was a higher level assignment than the ones she had handled before. It called for her to manifest as a Heavenly messenger, visibly heal someone, and do the whole ‘Be ye not afraid, live your life well with this second chance, demonstrate your gratitude to the Lord’ thing. She had done the manifestation part—that had been interesting, floating, surrounded by a glow, her long hair and white dress flowing in an ethereal breeze—and was now engaged in the healing.

Her hands were over the head of a man kneeling in front of her, surrounded by a handful of other people on their knees. Her hands were glowing, as was the rest of her, and she began to murmur her words of blessing, shutting out the sight of her parents. Compartmentalise. Work first. Fallout next.

  
  


Crowley put a hand out to stop Aziraphale from advancing, his energy crackling.

“Don’t interfere, angel,” he murmured. Aziraphale rounded on him.

“Don’t interfere! She’s in such danger, splashing out all over like this—so publicly! Look at the crowd she’s gathered!”

“Exactly. She’s set this up very carefully. This isn’t self-defence or a whim, angel. It’s deliberate.”

Aziraphale bristled, but kept to his place, watching Rosa like an eagle. Part of him was professionally evaluating her performance—a good balance of presence and demure holiness, reassurance, beatific but in control—while the rest of him paced back and forth like a lion in a cage, wanting to sweep her up in his wings and hide her from both human and supernatural eyes.

“Heaven will get wind of this, and she’ll be in such danger,” he muttered, twisting his hands together so hard that his nails started leaving red marks on his skin. Without taking his eyes off Rosa, Crowley reached out and put one of his hands over Aziraphale’s, stilling the nervous movement. Aziraphale clung to Crowley’s hand instead, gripping it so hard that it would have crushed the bones of anyone else.

Rosa lifted her hands away from the man’s head, smiled at the assembled humans, and vanished. 

  
  


“Well,” she said, walking toward them across the square, unseen by anyone else. “This is… an unexpected pleasure.”

Crowley snorted. Aziraphale’s nervous anger increased a few notches.

“Rosa Victoria Zipporah, what do you think you are doing?” he snapped.

“A manifestation, a healing, and a blessing,” she said, lifting her chin. “That man was dying of a rare bone disease. He has quite the fortune. He and his family came to Notre Dame to pray today. Now that he has been miraculously healed by an angel, he is going to announce a massive donation to finish the restoration of the cathedral. His experience will inspire others to do the same.”

Aziraphale stared at her. She brushed a stray lock of hair out of her face; it was still calming down from the floaty thing. Crowley’s eyes moved from one to the other.

“Rosa,” Aziraphale said, his voice resonating with Principality authority. “Why are you doing this?”

She took a deep breath.

“It was my assignment from Heaven.”

Suddenly Aziraphale’s true self was pushing at the confines of his corporation. Crowley felt the electricity in the air and saw flickers of multiple wings and a phantom sword just beyond the physical plane.

“Steady on, angel,” he murmured.

“Who did this to you?” Aziraphale demanded, his voice echoing with an overlay of several voices. His right hand was out to the side, and the sword was almost visible to the naked eye now.

Rosa closed her eyes, breathed in, then opened them.

“I did,” she said. “I summoned the Archangel Michael into a binding circle and made a deal with her.”

“You did _what_.” Crowley stepped back as Aziraphale’s angelic nature finally burst past his crumbling control. A whirlwind of energy began to swirl around the three of them. Crowley braced himself. Rosa ducked her head to the side, eyes pressed shut, then drew herself up and _pushed_ , her hands coming up in front of her to divert the energy. 

“You do _not_ raise your power to me, Rosa Victoria Zipporah Fell-Crowley!” roared Aziraphale. And before Crowley could step in to mitigate the increasing disaster, the angel barked, “This holiday is over!” and snapped his fingers.

Where three people had stood in the square before Notre Dame, there was now nothing but a dying wind.

  
  


Everyone caught their balance in the cottage living room. Various looks of confusion and surprise were shared for a moment, until the tension snapping between Aziraphale and Rosa sank in.

“What happened?” Datura said, bewildered. “Why are we home?”

“Because,” Aziraphale said, hands opening and clenching into fists at his sides, “we do not have family disputes in public. We have them in private.”

“Family... disputes,” Junior said after a moment. He swallowed hard.

“We need to straighten something out,” Crowley said, crossing his arms.

Angelica looked from Aziraphale to Rosa and sat down on the sofa, her own arms crossed and a grimly expectant look on her face. Needing reassurance, Clem slithered up onto the sofa beside her. Datura nibbled their lower lip, then sat down cross-legged by the cold hearth.

“ _What_ ,” Aziraphale said, “possessed you to do something so incredibly foolish, dangerous, perilously ill-advised, and risky?”

“Azirafather,” Rosa said steadily. “I promise you that I did not go into this unprepared.”

At the edge of the room Junior exhaled and leaned against the archway to the kitchen, body slumping as if he was releasing tension. Crowley looked over briefly, eyebrows drawn together, but turned back to Rosa as Aziraphale said, “Unprep—you have no idea what Heaven is capable of—”

“You taught us well,” Rosa said. “You and Father explained the politics and machinations and how they abused you. Both of you,” she added, looking at Crowley. “You’ve impressed upon us the dangers we face if we’re found out. I am, Azirafather, very well aware of the severity of the situation.”

“Then why—” Aziraphale was struggling to manage his anger in a way Crowley hadn’t seen for centuries. “— _would you do such a thing?_ Why would you be so foolish as to walk directly into the situation we have been trying to protect you from since the moment you were hatched? How could—how could you _deliberately_ go against everything I’ve taught you, Rosa? I thought you knew better—I thought you were more clever than this!”

Rosa inhaled sharply at his shouted words. Something in Aziraphale’s heart twisted. In the past ten minutes he had both raised angelic power against his beloved child, and accused her of not thinking. He wasn’t handling this very well. But the next moment, the tide of anger and terror rose again and drowned out the twinge of guilt and pain.

“Your arrogance,” he bit out, “has not only made you a target of Heaven, but has brought this entire family to its attention. I never thought you capable of such _irresponsible_ action, Rosa. You’ve walked deliberately into what your father and I have fought to protect you from.”

“To keep the rest of you safe!” Rosa cried out, finally losing her composure. “All our lives you’ve impressed upon us how careful we have to be, how quiet, how we have to protect ourselves. You were perfectly clear, Azirafather: we all live in the shadow of Heaven and Hell. So I took all the protective procedures you taught us, and all the theoretical angelic magic we studied together, and I designed a summoning circle capable of binding one of the most powerful angels in Heaven. I drew up a contract that had zero loopholes or soft clauses, and I bound Michael to it. The condition was that the rest of the family would be untouchable if I would handle assignments for them now and then. Like... you used to.”

Aziraphale felt his mouth fall open. He felt behind him and sank slowly into his armchair. From the kitchen doorway, Junior made a choking sound.

“You foolish, headstrong girl,” Aziraphale breathed.

“I did it for you and Father,” Rosa said, and there was a pleading note in her voice, overlaid with determination.

“So noble,” Angelica said flatly. “Such a martyr. Offering herself up so that the rest of us can have, what, normal lives? News flash, Rosa: we’re not normal, and never will be. Your delusions of grandeur haven’t saved anyone.”

Datura turned to look at Angelica, eyes wide.

“You knew,” they said. “You're not yelling anywhere near enough for this to be new information for you. You knew Rosa had made a deal with Heaven.”

“I know a lot more than that.” Angelica shot a furious look at her sister. “Go on, Father. Ask her about her deal with Dagon.”

“Her what,” Crowley said, quietly and crisply.

“Angelica!” Rosa said.

“You weren’t going to tell them!” Angelica bounced to her feet, leaning into Rosa’s face. “You were going to act as if your Heavenly deal was the only part of your idiot plan. Lying by omission is still lying, Ms Lawyer.”

Unable to take it anymore, Clem shifted into his human form.

“That’s enough,” he said. “Angelica, let her control how she shares the information.”

Angelica turned around to stare at him.

“ _You_ knew? You knew and didn’t tell anyone?”

“I promised I wouldn’t. I’m good at keeping secrets.” Clem refused to look away from his sister’s angry gaze. “Unlike you, I chose to support her. You know, being a helpful sounding board, a shoulder to lean on in an emotional situation. Her _friend_. You walked out on her, Angelica, and I honestly never thought that _any_ of us would be capable of doing that to a sibling.”

“Excuse me,” Crowley said. “Let’s get back to the matter at hand.” He stalked to the centre of the room where Rosa stood. “What have you done?” he said in a low voice that verged on menacing.

“Father,” said Rosa, “please understand. I made the same deal with both sides to keep things balanced. Neither side can touch you— _none_ of you. If I do a job for Hell, I do one for Heaven. I’m a freelance representative on earth, who knows and understands society and humans better than anyone else they’ve got. When the two of you retired they lost their two most knowledgeable operatives. I can control how this influence is disseminated for the minimal spread of fallout. Don’t you trust me more than a demon?”

“The issue of how much we trust you after knowing what you’ve done is under review,” Aziraphale snapped.

“You _know_ what they’re capable of. I’ve told you about some of the things they had me do,” Crowley said. Across the room, Junior made another choked noise. Datura quietly got up and moved around the edge of the room to him. Instead of touching him, Datura leaned against the other side of the archway, nodding at him reassuringly.

“I do know, Father,” Rosa said. “And I’m arguing that offering them a deal in which I set out the terms is a way to make sure that never happens again.”

“Are you all right, mate?” Datura murmured to Junior. “You’ve gone white.”

“Just—a surprise, is all. Can’t believe it.” Junior tried breathing deeply to calm his racing heart.

“How long?” Aziraphale demanded, getting to his feet to stand next to Crowley. “How long has this been going on?”

“Since the end of last summer.” Rosa held her ground, looking back and forth between her fathers. “This was my sixth assignment. The first big public one.”

“Let me get this straight,” Datura said, “you do jobs for Heaven and Hell, and they pretend the rest of us don’t exist?”

“Essentially. No one comes after you. You’re free for the rest of your existence.”

“What happens when Hell asks you to murder somebody?” Angelica demanded. Junior dug his fingers into the doorframe.

“I say no.” Rosa’s shoulders went back, and she lifted her chin. She looked back to her fathers. “That was a clause I put in the contract. I’ll nudge, I’ll influence, but nothing drastic.”

“That’s bloody naive,” Crowley said disparagingly. “Hell doesn’t follow rules you lay out for them, Rosa. Hell’s bread and butter is contracts that seem innocent but are actually to their advantage.”

“Not this one,” Rosa said. “Dagon herself said she was impressed.”

“Hell is also good at _lying_ _!”_ Crowley ran his hands over his face. “Right, angel. You head up, I’ll head down. We need to destroy this contract and get her back.”

“No!” Rosa cried. “You can’t!”

“You, young lady, cannot stop us,” Aziraphale said coldly.

“Actually… I can.” Rosa looked apologetic. “There’s a non-interference clause in the contract. If either of you move against either side, the contract is null and void—”

“Good,” said Aziraphale.

“—and the rest of the family becomes fair game.”

“ _What?”_ roared Crowley, his cool facade finally breaking.

“Father,” Rosa said with exasperation, “everyone knows your first reaction would be to roll into your respective ex-places of employment. _We_ know that they would love an excuse to serve you some kind of smackdown for your roles in derailing the Apocalypse and throwing everything they’ve worked for into question. Except none of _them_ want to deal with that, because no one wants to piss off Gran. Not us, not them. I am an independent contractor. That means no interference from you.”

Crowley gaped at her. “Ngk,” he finally said.

“It’s a new arrangement,” Rosa said. “Completely separate from what came before. I designed it; I brokered it; I’m executing it. You have to let me make my own choices.”

“You don’t know enough about the world to make informed choices!” Aziraphale shouted. “You’re—”

“If you want to be pedantic, I’m about ten years old,” Rosa said. “Except we’re demonic-angelic hybrids with powers no one has seen before, and we grow and learn insanely quickly. I know ten years is a drop in the bucket compared to six thousand, but please, Azirafather. You taught us. Trust yourself to have prepared us!”

Aziraphale felt something indescribable claw its way up his throat.

“I—I have to—” He pushed blindly past Crowley. “I can’t be here right now.”

“Azirafather!” Rosa cried. The slam of the front door echoed through the cottage.

“Congratulations,” Angelica said. “I hope you’re happy.”

“Okay, now,” Datura said. “That’s enough. We’re all in a bad headspace, and maybe we should take a step back?”

Crowley slumped into Aziraphale’s chair and rubbed his temples.

“You spawn will be the death of me,” he said. “This day has been indescribable. Rosa. Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Because of how you both just reacted,” she said. “Really, Father?”

“Don’t, Rosa,” he said. “Just don’t.”

Junior found words clawing their way up his throat, words he initially tried to fight but gave in and flung at his father.

“Maybe,” he said venomously, “if you were paying more attention to your children, you’d have noticed that one was involved with your old bosses.”

Both Datura and Clem turned and looked at him in astonishment. Crowley froze, then slowly lifted his head and fixed his gaze on Junior.

“I’m a fan of letting you lot find your own way,” he said. “Of course I want what’s best for you. But living looking over your shoulders isn’t the way to do that. Besides, look who’s talking; you’ve barely spent a dozen days at home since you went up to the city, and you don’t return calls.”

“We wouldn’t be in this bloody mess if you’d been a better father!” Junior shouted. “But you’re a demon, aren’t you, and seeing people in pain doesn’t bother you at all. Because you’re used to causing misery and sadness and anger and—”

“ _That is enough,_ ” Crowley hissed, rising to his feet. His eyes had gone fully yellow. “You are way out of line. You don’t get to judge me, Anthony. You have no idea what my life was like and how torturous it—”

“Shut up!” Junior yelled. “You don’t know _anything_ about torture!”

Crowley took a step toward him and Junior whirled, heading for the kitchen. He had to get away, away from his father and his siblings before he did something he’d deeply regret.

Datura put their hands up in a calming pose as he approached and said, “Whoa, Anthony, let’s take a moment to do some deep breathing and—”

Snarling, Junior swung his fist at Datura, who stumbled back, the blow barely missing. 

“ _Anthony!”_ Crowley shouted.

The stunned and wounded look on Datura’s face only pushed Junior further into the morass of anger and self-hatred. “Go to Hell, all of you,” he said roughly, and escaped through the kitchen door.

Rosa, Angelica, Clem, and Datura all looked at one another, and then their eyes turned to their father. Crowley stood in the centre of the room, trembling with tension and emotion.

“Father?” Clem ventured. Crowley blinked.

“Yeah. Yeah, so, that was... I wonder if this day can get any worse.” Crowley shook himself, then reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a pair of sunglasses. He settled them on the bridge of his nose, pushing his hair behind his ears. “I have to find Aziraphale.” He pointed at Rosa. “We are not done with this conversation, not by a long shot.” He made his way to the door, then paused, a hand on the doorknob. “Be safe, you lot,” he said without turning around.

“We won’t even singe the edges of things,” Datura said with a weak smile. Crowley nodded, his eyes on his hand.

“Right. Good.”

He waited a moment longer, then opened the door and stepped out.

“So,” Clem said shakily. “About that idea of taking a breath and stepping back for a bit?”

“I’m going to my room,” Rosa said quietly. She went up the stairs slowly. The three who were left all sighed together as they heard her door click shut.

“I really didn’t want to say ‘I told you so,’ but here we are,” Angelica said, looking up the stairs.

“Drop it, Angelica,” Clem said wearily. “What’s done is done.”

He took a deep breath and shifted back into snake form. Angelica looked embarrassed; she hesitated for a moment, then went upstairs to her own room. Datura came over and sat next to Clem.

“Well,” they said. “This is not how I expected our third day in Paris to go.”

Clem drew himself in miserably. Datura looked down, then shifted into their own snake form and curled up with him, their lighter coils draped over his heavier ones.

_What happens next?_ Datura asked.

Clem didn’t know.


	11. Round and Round: Paris is Burning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're at rock-bottom, folks; time to look around and see where we've landed.

Distance had never really been something Aziraphale needed, but, oh, did he need it now.

He couldn’t remember ever being so furious in his life. He could—he could very well spit nails, at this juncture. He could twist railroad ties into pretzels. He could crack open his daughter’s stubborn skull and dig around until he found the madness that had taken root there—

Aziraphale walked, insensible of where he was going, powered by spite and the knowledge that if he walked long enough, surely some kind of sense would shake itself loose from the universe and drop on him, because the universe was designed intelligently and always made sense even if it didn’t necessarily make sense to  _ him _ .

“Are you happy?” Aziraphale growled skyward, his hands curled into fists, the undergrowth flattening away from him under the lashings of his unconscious temper. “Are you  _ pleased _ this has all gone so wrong? Did you give them to us just to take them away like this?”

There wasn’t so much as a breath of wind as he stalked through the countryside. Given that She had once taken tea under his very roof, he found this more intolerable than any other silence, and he yowled with frustration, slapping a tree branch out of his way and exploding it to atoms.

“Answer me!” he demanded. “What am I to do about this? What’s the—the best way to—handle it?” He kicked at a pebble in his path and lodged it firmly into a tree trunk nearby. “I’m—falling apart, it doesn’t make sense, how could she—she gets this from  _ you _ , you know, thinking she knows best, but she’s not You, she’s a child, she—” Aziraphale felt his throat starting to tighten as he hadn’t allowed it to in the house, eyes prickling in rage and helpless, surging fear. “She’s—just a child. In the grand scheme of it all. My child. My sweet rose. How could You let her do this? How could—how could  _ I _ have let her do this?”

Aziraphale dropped to his knees and brought his shaking hands together, but kept his face turned towards the heavens, seeking supplication but refusing to be cowed. “Show me what to do,” he begged. “Tell me how to save her. I can’t—I can’t lose her, I can’t lose any of them, I won’t, I—please,  _ please _ —”

With all the onset of a summer storm, Aziraphale broke down for the first time in a long time, trembling like a wind-tossed sapling. He let himself feel it all, every ounce of pain and fear and heartache and hurt. He thought he felt an intruding presence poking at him and shoved it away as he begged in his mother tongue, holiness crackling along his jaw and up his limbs. He cried until his throat was raw and his eyes were dry. When he had bled all he could out of his battered heart and bruised voice, he sat quietly on the ground and just listened. So often people forgot this part, the quiet meditation. So often he himself forgot this part, too, as integral a part of prayer as any chant or psalm.

No solution magically presented itself to him, no flash of inspiration on how to get Rosa out of the entanglement she’d created. He did allow himself to feel a single thread of pride—there was every chance that she had miscalculated, that Michael ( _ and Dagon, _ his mind whispered,  _ try as she might have done to hide it, she went to Dagon, too _ ) was playing Rosa for a fool and was waiting on her to outstay her usefulness or amusement—but she had summoned an Archangel of the Lord and gotten her to sign an agreement that was binding in some capacity. Aziraphale had never heard of such a thing ever being done before. Had theorized about it plenty, but never would have dreamed that Rosa would use his ramblings as the basis of a practical experiment.

Shame threatened to overwhelm him again, but there was no place for shame in this quiet moment of peace after his personal storm. A warm breeze blew across his face and ruffled his hair, distinct against the chill of the evening. When had it gotten dark? He must’ve drifted off.

_ Go home, _ it seemed to say.  _ All will be well. Go home. _

He didn’t feel ready. He wasn’t sure he ever would be.

But whether or not Aziraphale felt up to facing Rosa and what she had done, he was more than ready to at least face Crowley, to commiserate with his husband and comfort and be comforted. Crowley always got them out of trouble, especially if Aziraphale had first gotten them into it. They would think of something.

Crowley didn’t see Junior when he left the house, which was…probably for the best, all things considered. Part of him wanted to box Junior’s ears for being…whatever the Heaven and Hell and all in between  _ that _ was. Part of him had a different set of alarm bells ringing from Rosa’s shindig entirely. First that mugger, now his sibling? And not even one he fought with all the time, but  _ Datura _ ?

Unfortunately, Crowley knew himself well enough to know that if he went after Junior, all that would happen was a fight. Junior would have to take care of himself for now. Crowley needed to find Aziraphale. Who, inconveniently, was also nowhere to be seen. He did a full walk around the cottage, and when staring around and calling for his angel produced no results, he closed his eyes and cast out his awareness, looking for that angelic spark he loved so well.

He found it fairly close by, but before he could get a lock on Aziraphale’s location, the spark…slipped. Crowley staggered mid-step and steadied himself against the garden wall. Was that…no, it couldn’t have been, surely he wouldn’t have—Crowley cast out again, rather more desperately, and found Aziraphale again, but then Aziraphale did something—he couldn’t tell what it was, but it was the equivalent of slamming a door with a “do not disturb” sign hung on it. If Crowley tried, really and truly tried, he could dig in and force Aziraphale to reveal his location, but Crowley was all out of fight. If he didn’t want to be found, Crowley wouldn’t find him. He sat on the garden wall and sighed, lacing his fingers together and staring blankly at his hands.

“Bring them home,” he mumbled. “Whatever else happens, just bring them all home safe to me.”

There were other words Crowley would have loved to have with his Maker, but those would suffice for now. Rosa’s contracts, Junior’s spiral, Aziraphale’s fury—these were all things they could figure out once everyone was  _ home _ .

It was nearly dark before Aziraphale sat next to Crowley on the wall, Crowley stiff from having not moved in the dropping temperatures.

“Silly serpent,” Aziraphale murmured, wrapping his arm around Crowley and rubbing his skin with his hands. Crowley leaned into the warmth and the touch with unparalleled hunger, grateful that he could feel Aziraphale with both physical and demonic senses.

“Ready to go back inside?” Crowley said, and Aziraphale sighed.

“I…don’t think I can face her just yet,” Aziraphale said. “I need more time, I think. To process.”

“Don’t think she wants to face us, either,” Crowley said, and Aziraphale made an unhappy sound. “Come on. Inside’s warm, we can talk more about it there.” Aziraphale stared at the house for a moment; Crowley could feel the gentle probe of angelic energy as Aziraphale took stock of everyone in the house, taking in general locations and surface moods. He frowned.

“Where’s Junior?” Aziraphale asked, and Crowley shrugged.

“Ran off,” he said, and offered no more information. There was already so much going on…he wasn’t sure if bogging Aziraphale down with his personal worries about what could just be a rash of bad sleep deprivation was worth it. Maybe it would come up after they were done beating Rosa’s dead horse, or whatever the expression was. They walked back to the cottage with their arms around each other, passing through the empty family room and by the kitchen, where Datura was cooking stew.

“Smells good,” Crowley remarked, steering Aziraphale towards the stove. Datura looked over their shoulder and half-smiled, indicating the stack of bowls on the counter.

“Nobody else was hungry, I wasn’t sure if you would be,” they said.

“I’ll have a spot of it, I think,” Aziraphale said, and Crowley accepted a bowl on principle. He clapped Datura on the shoulder as he passed, and together he and Aziraphale retreated into their room. Maybe they couldn’t figure anything out at the moment, especially without knowing the exact terms of Rosa’s contract, but there had to be something they could do. There had to be.

Junior tore out of the house like a bat out of…well…you know. This was stupid, pointless. He was so furious he couldn’t even articulate  _ why _ .

He snapped and one of Father’s scotch bottles appeared in his hand. Snapped the other, and lo, a carton of cigarettes. He’d never smoked before, but it seemed like as good a time as any to try.

His feet carried him into the windbreak, to one of the old forts that had mostly collapsed with neglect since he and his siblings had grown too big for them. He tore the lid from the scotch and took a gulp, coughed most of it up, and tried again. He was starting to get the hang of this hard alcohol thing.

He took one of the cigarettes out of its box, stared at it hard for a moment, and then placed it in his mouth, the end smoldering. He took a pull. Somehow the smoke came easier, filling his lungs and leaving them in a smooth breath. Good enough.

“Stupid,” he mumbled. “Doesn’t know—doesn’t know  _ anything _ .”

He tried to divert thought from how angry he was at Father to Rosa’s little bombshell and found his mental processes slid off of it entirely. He couldn’t fathom it. He tried to imagine Rosa reporting to Hastur and something caught in his lungs, until he was coughing so hard he didn’t even realize it was laughter until the sound of it started reverberating off the trees around him. He laughed and he laughed and somewhere in that laughter he finished his cigarette and lit another.

The clearing was soon smoky enough that rays of sunlight filtering through were visible. Junior looked at them, then took a pull of scotch, holding it burning in his mouth before spraying it into the light, just to see what it would look like. There was no rainbow but the fine mist that erupted from his mouth was kind of cool-looking, actually. Lookie there. Beauty in pain, or some drivel like that.

There was the whisper of a thought, just a bare peep, in the back of his mind, something hopeful that Junior didn’t want to examine too closely. He stayed in the glade until he’d smoked the entire pack and drunk the entire bottle, watching the smoke swirling in the dying light. Beauty in pain. Meaning in destruction.

Then he breathed wrong and caught a whiff of himself, smelling two unshowered weeks away from Hastur, and his heart froze in his chest. He miracled the smell away without a thought, burned all traces of tobacco away, and let the drunken remains of his mind doze off for a little while. Drunkenness was fine. Few things could get him while he was too numb to process properly. Wonderful little coping mechanism, this.

When he woke up to a dark wood and a cold breeze, he sighed, purged the rest of the mess from his system, and creaked his way home. If he was lucky, maybe he’d be able to sneak up to his room to sleep for a while without running into anyone. Part of him wanted to walk away, to keep walking until he found someplace new, but he was tired and for better or worse he still had a home here. If God had ever loved him maybe he wouldn’t have to face Father at all until he knew what to say to him.

_ “Your work is rubbish, Crowley,” Hastur said, glaring at him, “even more than it’s supposed to be.” _

_ “Guys, it’s called mass marketing, it’s not supposed to work on a small scale—” Junior tried, his voice a touch too gravelly, just a bit too deep. _

_ “Enough,” Hastur snapped. “We’re replacing you.” _

_ Junior frowned, and then Rosa stepped up from the gloom, perfect white curls and impassive face; she was too short and too young but in the right shadow she looked just like a particular angel. The floor opened up under Junior’s feet and he dropped, screaming, into a boiling pit— _

Junior clawed his way back to wakefulness and stifled his hoarse screams in his pillow, breathing heavily and praying to Someone that he hadn’t woken anyone up. He shook like a leaf as he tried to walk and made himself stand until his legs, at least, cooperated enough to not wake the house. Junior counted to twenty, then tiptoed out of his room. No lights on downstairs as he crept down them and let himself out into the back garden, then into the greenhouse. Junior nearly collapsed against one of the tables, letting himself fall apart a little.

Hastur was going to kill him one day. He had to make his peace with that. And yet a little voice inside Junior screamed that he didn’t want to die, surely there was something else he could do—where would he even go, if he was destroyed? Would he cease to exist? Would his soul go to Hell? To Heaven? Nowhere?

And on top of that, there was Rosa, who was playing the big hero and working for their dads’ old bosses and if that wasn’t just a punch in the gut…she  _ chose _ it. She wasn’t ripped from sleep in the middle of the night with phantom fingers pawing at her face. She received paperwork and did tiny jobs where she probably didn’t have to kill anyone and everything was so  _ perfect _ for her, wasn’t it?

Junior’s blurry vision focused in on the plant in front of him—a little chrysanthemum, with yellowed leaves. Probably some kind of rot, Junior thought,  _ just like me _ .

His hand snatched out for the pot and he dragged the plant closer to him, looking it over, shaking hands none too gentle as he finally ripped it up from the roots. There. Just as he thought: roots too slimy to gather any proper nutrients from the soil, jumping from one to the next in an evil-smelling infection. Junior’s hands shook harder and he half-crushed the thing in his grip.

“You’re pathetic,” he snarled, voice barely above a whisper and venomous. “Pathetic and stupid and weak.” He threw the wasted chrysanthemum down and moved to the next plant, a snake plant with a broken stalk. “And you. How dare you snap off when you have the best care, hmm? Be better.” He shoved the snake plant off the table, where its pot shattered against the ground and the dirt went everywhere. Junior could feel himself shouting and he heard the breaking of pots, felt the shower of soil on his hands and the crunch of leaves, and could see none of it in his blind rage. When he came back to himself, panting, in the middle of the greenhouse, he blinked and finally saw the damage he’d done. Every single plant in the place was smashed either on the ground or against the wall. Some of them were torn to shreds. All of them were shaking.

Junior found himself sitting rather more suddenly than he expected, staring at his earth-darkened hands, at the vicious claws that grew there, and thought he might do himself a favor and just take the eyes out now, give Hastur one less thing to do. Take the eyes. The tongue. The ears. Peel the skin from his entire face. Unmask his skull.

Junior’s mind whispered at him and it was deafening.

Two hands grasped his wrists, and the silence was just as loud.

Junior knew these hands, holding his unfamiliar arms. Small and soft and strong. He wanted to clutch her arms, too, but his fingers flexed and he scared himself. He felt a warm press of lips against the top of his head and broke. Rosa held him and made soothing sounds as he cried.

“Oh, Anthony,” Rosa murmured. “It’s alright. I’ve got you. The nightmares can’t find you here.”

“They’ll find me,” Junior croaked. “Always do. Find me. Already inside me. Look what I did. Look what I  _ did _ .”

“Sshh,” Rosa hushed him and buried his face in her shoulder, close to her neck; this had the double benefit of blocking out the rest of the world and inundating him with her familiar scent, calming since birth even when he was mad at her. Time was meaningless here in the dark she created for him, shielding him as he bled out the corruption taking root in his heart. Sobs turned to hiccups and still she held him, stroking his hair and rocking him ever so slightly. They had both been more or less still and quiet for a long time before Junior felt well enough to take his face back out. His hands were back to normal, if still dirt-crusted.

“You’ve been going through something, too,” Rosa said softly. “Please tell me.”

“Like you told me?” Junior said, voice rusty.

“If I had told you, you would have told Father and Azirafather,” Rosa said. Junior frowned. “Don’t give me that look, you would have. You aren’t made for keeping secrets, big brother.”

“Still could’ve said something,” Junior muttered.

“I’m saying something now,” Rosa sighed, and sat back from him, her nightshirt dirt-stained. “What’s happening with you? I can feel your pain all the way from the house. Saw your nightmare.”

Junior tried to clear his throat and sounded more like the Bentley on an early frosty morning. “Did…anyone else…?”

“If they did, they aren’t out here,” Rosa said simply. “I imagine they’re sleeping off yesterday’s…tiff. Even Azirafather.”

Junior grunted and nodded. He sighed, sucking in a breath and letting it go shakily. “Um. You. Remember Hastur. Um.” He ran a hand through his hair without thinking about the dirt. “He’s been. Been paying me some visits.”

Rosa’s pupils turned razor-thin and her eyes bled blue all the way to the edge. It was a sight more disconcerting than when Junior’s did the same, in Junior’s opinion. “When did he—what is he doing? When? How?”

“Bit after first term started,” Junior grunted. “In my dreams. Sometimes on the street. S’been giving me jobs. Making me watch stuff Father used to do. Calls me his intern.” He took a deep, shuddering breath. “H-hurts me. Sometimes.”

“He isn’t allowed to be doing that,” Rosa said, her voice two hairs away from feral, and Junior felt gratified rather than scared, for once. “It’s in the terms, none of you are to be—he’s not getting away with this, if I have to serve his punishment in Hell myself. He’s not going near you again.”

“N-not sure if it matters anymore,” Junior mumbled. “Look—look at what I did. To Father’s plants.”

“I know,” Rosa said, and took Junior’s hands in hers. “I can help fix some of this up before he wakes up, but…Junior, I wish you’d told me. I could have helped months ago.”

“Take me with you,” Junior said before he could think too hard about it. Rosa closed her mouth, sighed, and shook her head.

“No. I’m not bringing you in there. That’s the last thing you need.”

“If—if Hastur’s about to—I need to,” Junior argued, or tried, anyway, with his brain unravelling like spaghetti. “I need to make sure he stops, I need to—”

“Listen to me carefully,” Rosa said, and tightened her grip on his hands. “You are not going with me to Hell. You are desperate and in pain and everything Hell wants in a soul, and you would be a valuable asset to them. You’ll do or say anything to make the pain stop, and you are a liability like this. Leave it to me. Trust me to do this for you.”

Junior felt his eyes filling back up and laughed mirthlessly. “You—such a—”

“Hypocrite?” Rosa asked lightly. “Idiot? Selfish, cruel person? I know. Angelica’s already said.”

“Was gonna say badass,” Junior mumbled, and almost smiled at Rosa’s surprised little laugh. “Always wanted to be a cool double agent. You went and did it for me.”

“I went into it with my eyes open,” Rosa said softly. “You were dragged and tortured and coerced. This life isn’t for you, Junior, you belong with green growing things and people to laugh at your awful jokes.”

Junior finally made himself look at the damage around him with clearer eyes, cataloging what could be fixed. “What do you reckon, big miracle to set it all back to rights?”

“At least to fix the pots,” Rosa nodded. “We can do the rest by hand.”

And they did—Rosa fixed up the flowerpots all as good as new, and Junior dug his clever fingers into the soil and re-potted every plant that was still in good enough condition. Those that weren’t, he laid atop their refilled pots and set aside. Father would deserve an apology, even if Junior couldn’t muster an explanation just yet. When they were done, Junior glanced at Rosa and almost laughed at the dirt streaked across her nose.

“There,” Rosa said, and brushed the remaining earth from her hands. It was still caked under her nails, though not nearly as thickly as under Junior’s. It felt right, somehow. Rosa reached up and touched Junior’s cheek, and for the first time in a while Junior didn’t even mind. “I’m leaving soon, and I’m going to fix this. I promise, no one from Heaven or Hell is going to ever touch you again.”

Junior wanted to believe. He wanted to so badly he almost did, just for a second. He smiled mechanically and nodded, shrugging.

“Stay for breakfast?” he said. Rosa’s own smile turned sad.

“I don’t think I should,” she said. “I meant to leave last night, but, well. Got sidetracked.”

“Come back when you’re done,” Junior said, and Rosa’s sad smile widened. “Promise me.”

“When I’m done, I will come back and see you,” Rosa nodded. “Promise.”

It wasn’t exactly what Junior had meant and he could see the many, many loopholes she had included in the statement for her to wriggle through, but, well, better than nothing. He hugged her and let her return to the house, knowing she was probably just going to miracle herself away.

Junior looked over the greenhouse and sighed, rubbing his dirty hands through his hair. Father wasn’t going to be too pleased with him. Frankly…even if Father knew the real reason, Junior didn’t think he really deserved Father’s forgiveness. Maybe he should go, too.

He watched the sunrise from the greenhouse and breathed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quilly here; If you're in need of a laugh this morning, please go to the YouTube and search "Hot Rod forest dance scene" to know the scene I had to picture to make myself laugh after Junior's bits, because I definitely, definitely borrowed a lot of the aesthetic of that scene without playing it for comedy. Writing Junior has been so difficult but the catharsis is coming.


	12. Round and Round: Je n’aime plus Paris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After such upheaval, people need to process their emotions...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this one ended up being entirely Quilly's again when we divided what we'd written into chapters! Enjoy.

The floor of Hell rumbled.

Dagon frowned. That was odd. Hell was subterranean and prone to all sorts of seismic activity, but that hadn’t felt like a general earthquake—it was a specific, concentrated vibration, more like an explosion.

It happened again and sounded closer. Dagon watched the ripples in her coffee sludge and reached for her rotary phone, not even sure who to call but sure that _someone_ should probably know…

An imp scuttled by her office window, followed by a stampede of demons flooding to get out of the way of something. Dagon switched her reach from the phone to the lead pipe next to her desk. The rumble was closing in, and Dagon tasted ozone on the back of her tongue—not the chemical-clean burn of Heaven, but something like it, like a wild electric storm.

There was a second of silent stillness.

Then Dagon’s office door was ripped from its hinges and tossed aside by a glowing figure. It took Dagon a second to recognize Rosa Fell-Crowley, wreathed in white flame with her pale curls whipping about her head, her face a picture of cold fury. It was an impressive display; Dagon could see how the brat had made it this far unchallenged.

“Where is Hastur?” Rosa snarled.

“Hastur?” Dagon blinked. “You came all the way down here and tore off my door for _Hastur_?”

“He’s in violation of my contract,” Rosa replied, hair sweeping around as if in a gale as she stalked towards Dagon’s desk. “It is clearly stated in my employee agreement that I and my family are to be left _alone_.”

“As you’ve reminded me for the eight hundredth time.” Dagon rolled her eyes to distract from how the scales on her cheeks were starting to crisp up. The power radiating off of Rosa was neither Heavenly nor Hellish, but something…entirely Else. Something new. Something that would have no trouble swallowing a demon up if caught. Dagon made the tiniest of swallows as her throat dried.

“Produce him so that he can face consequences,” Rosa thundered, “or I will rip Hell a new one myself.”

“Yes, you’re very scary,” Dagon said. “Sit down and fill out a grievance form. When that’s done, there will be a hearing, and then sentencing. Does that satisfy you, princess?”

Rosa stared at her for a long time. Dagon would have banished the sweat beading up on her forehead, except it was moistening her skin back up and she rather needed it.

“He’ll get the punishment he deserves,” Rosa said, almost not a question. Dagon laughed.

“This is Hell,” Dagon grinned. “All we deal in is just desserts.”

Rosa kept up her frightening aura during the entire time she was sitting at an intern’s desk filling out the grievance form in triplicate, and didn’t even glance at Dagon walking by, on her way to find someone to bully into revealing Hastur’s location. Dagon was glancing at her plenty, though. The recent conversation with Michael played itself over and over in her head. More responsibility…what if…

Dagon stalked up to the desk and ripped the forms from under Rosa’s fountain pen, balling them up and tossing them aside.

“Actually,” Dagon said as Rosa glared up at her, “I’ve had an idea.”

Rosa raised an eyebrow.

“It’s your precious contract,” Dagon grinned, feeling her dry lips split under the motion. “There’s nothing to say that you can’t carry out the retribution yourself, not if he violated terms first. Would you like that, duckie? Getting your hands on him yourself?”

Rosa’s eyes flared ice-blue and serpentine and Dagon smiled wider.

“I want this left to me, then,” Rosa said. “No backdoor deals to get him out of it, no calling foul when he gets what’s coming to him.”

“Of course,” Dagon leered.

“And if anyone from Hell so much as looks at my family again, I will be right back here, and I will be tearing off so much more than a door,” Rosa said. Her aura flared again. Dagon smiled innocently and ignored how the blood from her lip dried up under the heat.

“Right you are,” Dagon said.

“I would like that in writing, please,” Rosa said, and Dagon sighed and walked into her office for a fresh sheet of paper. With quite a lot of very annoying input, she had a release form for Hastur’s punishment for violation of employee contract drawn up soon enough. She rolled her eyes as Rosa snapped her fingers and duplicated the document, but signed both.

“Satisfied?” Dagon asked.

“Not remotely, but it’s a step in the right direction,” Rosa said, and folded the document into thin air. “Thank you ever so much for your cooperation in this matter, Lord Dagon.”

Dagon grunted and made a shooing gesture. Then she stared at her door and sighed. The work never ended, did it?

Crowley stared mutely at his greenhouse and didn’t bother to sort out his feelings; trying to pluck one from the maelstrom to examine would end with him getting sucked down and nobody needed that, really.

He could tell something had definitely happened. The plants that were still more or less alright in their pots were shivering. The wrecked ones…he touched the crumpled leaves of the long-dead chrysanthemum and snatched his hand back from the burst of pure pain that sparked like a static shock—not the plant’s pain, someone else’s. Junior’s, unless he was mistaken. Would make sense, something was obviously wrong, Crowley just couldn’t figure out how his greenhouse factored into it. He took a solid look around, noted the dirt that had obviously been scooped up by hand and not fully cleaned up. There was still the faint outline of a splash of earth across the wall, spattered like a particularly lurid bloodstain. His looking took him to the countertop, where a folded piece of paper sat with Crowley’s moniker on it.

_Father—sorry about the mess and about the plants I destroyed. Just going through some stuff right now but you didn’t deserve any of this. I tried my best to fix it but I can’t put everything back together how it was. I’ll call soon. Junior._

Crowley read it four times before deriving any sort of meaning from it. He walked without really looking where he was going back to the house, on his way to show Aziraphale, before the cracked-open garage door caught his attention. He looked through it and sighed deeply. No Bentley.

At this point he trusted the Bentley to look after itself and the kids better than Crowley himself could, but it was still disconcerting to see an empty garage when he didn’t expect it. He walked into the kitchen, sat at the table, and tossed Junior’s note onto its surface. Crowley wasn’t sure how long he sat there, but a mug entered his field of vision soon enough, and a second note joined the first as Aziraphale sat next to him. Crowley took the mug and drank without looking at it. Cocoa, of course. Aziraphale produced his own mug and gave a wan smile when Crowley finally looked at him.

“It occurs to me,” Aziraphale said, voice gravelly, “that I have become adept at driving people away over the last few centuries.”

Crowley sighed and slid the second note around towards him. This one was from Rosa, and simply said _I’m sorry for the inconvenience I caused you. I will be out of your hair and the bookshop as soon as possible._ He furrowed his brow at it.

“The bookshop?” he said aloud.

“What happened in the greenhouse?” Aziraphale asked, Junior’s note in his hand. They looked at each other.

“I think,” Crowley said, “we might have missed a few things.”

Aziraphale flinched, then sighed. “We might have, yes,” he said. “Not terribly unusual for us, when you consider it.”

Crowley snorted, then drank some cocoa. “Think Junior might’ve had a tantrum in there,” he said. “Threw some things around. Killed some plants.” He stood up and reached for Aziraphale’s hand. “Come on. You’re better at sensing feelings, need you to take a look at something.”

“Of course,” Aziraphale said, taking Crowley’s hand and letting Crowley pull him along. Crowley took him out to the greenhouse and gestured at the row of dead and shredded plants.

“Most of ‘em weren’t going to make it anyway, but I wasn’t planning on mulching them until they were…y’know…past help,” Crowley grunted. “Careful with the chrysanthemum, it’s—”

Aziraphale yelped and Crowley winced as Aziraphale’s hand retracted from that very plant. “It’s…how?” Aziraphale cried, shaking himself loose from Crowley’s grip and cradling the chrysanthemum in his hands. He looked up at Crowley, tears pouring down his face already, and Crowley felt a sharp stab of regret. “How could…why? When? When did he start feeling…like this?”

“What’s it feel like, angel?” Crowley asked, reaching for but not touching the chrysanthemum again. “I just get—pain.”

“So much of it.” Aziraphale closed his eyes. “Terror. Anger. Self…self-loathing.” Aziraphale opened his eyes and blinked mournfully at Crowley. “How did this happen?”

Crowley shrugged helplessly. His guts squirmed.

Aziraphale gently laid the chrysanthemum back on the dirt and cleaned his hands on his trousers before rubbing his eyes. “Our boy,” Aziraphale mumbled. “I had no idea.”

“Bentley’s gone,” Crowley said, and Aziraphale’s face shot out of his hands, a startled sentence dying half-formed on his lips when Crowley shrugged. “Figure wherever he is, at least he’s got the old girl looking out for him.”

“She always did take care of him so well,” Aziraphale said softly, and sighed. “Datura won’t be pleased, unless they’re with him.”

“Dunno.” Crowley shrugged. “Dunno who’s home anymore, really. Suppose we’ll find out when someone gets hungry and comes downstairs.”

There was a peculiar look on Aziraphale’s face dawning as Crowley spoke, the kind of look that rarely preceded anything good or constructive, but Crowley wasn’t fast enough to get ahead of it as Aziraphale opened his mouth.

“I…I ran our children out of their own home,” Aziraphale said, and without quite knowing how they got from point A to point B Crowley found himself with an armful of weeping angel and did his best to ride it out, making shushing sounds and trying to parse out the litany of verbal abuse Aziraphale was heaping on himself in mumbles against Crowley’s shoulder.

“You didn’t, angel, you really didn’t,” Crowley murmured. “They’re grown, alright, even when they were small we knew they would make decisions we didn’t agree with—”

“I never expected we’d push them into Heaven’s grip,” Aziraphale wailed, his hands shaking on Crowley’s back. “And Hell’s for good measure! We tried so hard to keep them safe, we tried _so hard_ —”

“I know, it’s absolutely mad—Aziraphale, angel, ssh, it’s alright, we can fix it—”

“How? How can we fix this? She made an airtight contract, she said so herself, and you know how she is about these things, doesn’t stop to consider for a moment she might be wrong, she’s risking everything and it’s _my fault_ —”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley said sternly, pulling back and cupping Aziraphale’s face in his hands, “stop. Right now.”

Aziraphale sniffed at him and his eyes leaked but he did stop speaking. Crowley wiped tears from his angel’s cheeks with his thumbs, trying to come up with words to help, to somehow twist it in their favor, but…it was pretty bleak, all told. He was still processing it all himself.

“We,” Crowley said, “can do nothing. Alright? We’re…she made sure we had absolutely no power in this situation. And we have none. Zip. Zero. Nada. If we get involved, we put not just Rosa at risk, but all of us.” Aziraphale hiccupped. Crowley smiled but it felt stiff on his face. “The best we can do,” Crowley continued, “is…wait, I suppose.”

“Wait for it all to come crashing around our ears again?” Aziraphale asked.

“Wait for an opportunity,” Crowley corrected. “If there is one. We learn from this. We keep our eyes open better. And if there’s a chance for us to help, we’ll help. Of course we’ll help.”

Aziraphale laughed wetly and clutched more firmly onto the back of Crowley’s sleep shirt. “If she’ll let us, you mean.”

“Listen, angel, we raised a force of nature,” Crowley shrugged. “But…but she’s not invincible. We both know this. One day, Rosa might even know it, too.”

Aziraphale smiled a little as Crowley pulled the handkerchief from Aziraphale’s pocket and dabbed at his face with it, wiping away his tears and making him blow his nose. Crowley magicked it clean and put the handkerchief back, then leaned Aziraphale’s forehead against his own and breathed, slow and even, which Aziraphale matched.

“We all just need some time,” Crowley murmured. “No way to really know what the future holds, not in full. All we can do is be ready to catch them if they need us. And if they don’t, at least they know we’re here for them. All of them.”

“I’m still so angry,” Aziraphale mouthed, a fresh round of tears welling up, but he pressed himself close to Crowley and pulled in a deep breath rather than succumbing to sobs again. “And so afraid.”

“I know, angel.” Crowley held him and the veil between planes wobbled as he wrapped his wings around him too, for good measure. “I know. I know.”

Angelica couldn’t say she was surprised that it had all broken down like it did—she’d been telling Rosa for ages that it was all going to blow up in her face, and she had been right, whoopee—but Junior’s meltdown left echoes she could feel as she descended the stairs. She would’ve gone out to the greenhouse herself last night, but Rosa beat her to it, and Angelica had no desire to face Rosa yet. When lunchtime rolled around and it became apparent that Junior wasn’t coming back anytime soon with the Bentley, Angelica took out her old bike and went for a ride.

There were many places in the countryside that a young man in a flash car might favor, but Angelica knew her brother well and his favorite spot was a willow by a stream that looked right out of a picture book; it was a little far without a car but the weather was fresh and fine, and Angelica needed the space to sort out her own feelings, anyway. She had been waiting with vindictive glee for the ball to drop on Rosa, but having it happen like that, so suddenly and without any kind of control…Angelica hadn’t wanted it all to come out quite like that, even if she thought it might. Azirafather had never shouted at any of them like that before. And Junior…something else was happening there, something bad. Might as well try and tackle the problem she could more readily fix.

She found Junior where she expected to, sitting on the banks of the stream with his feet in the water, and Angelica joined him, rolling up her leggings and putting her trainers to the side.

“You knew,” Junior said. Angelica didn’t need clarification.

“Yeah,” Angelica nodded. “And it blew up, like I knew it would.”

“You knew she would get caught during a family vacation and make Azirafather panic-teleport us all back home from Paris?” Junior asked, and Angelica snorted.

“Or something like that,” Angelica nodded. “She was irresponsible and stupid for thinking it would work.”

They were silent for a moment.

“But…it does work,” Junior said. Angelica rolled her eyes.

“It doesn’t work,” she said. “It just hasn’t failed yet. There’s a difference.”

“Why do you think it will?”

“Because Heaven and Hell are…they’re not humans,” Angelica frowned. “They’re immortal institutions established by God Herself, and one puny angel-demon hybrid isn’t going to con them into playing nice.” Angelica curled up her knee and rested her head on it. “If they want to kill us, they can, and putting us on the radar just speeds up the inevitability.”

“Mmm.” Junior lifted his foot from the water, inspecting the scaly toes that dripped in the sun. “Or maybe she knows what she’s doing and might’ve just helped us create a real third side, with actual protections and functions.”

Angelica scoffed. Junior looked at her with big, sad eyes and a small, sad smile.

“The thing is,” he said, “I…I need her to have done that.”

“Why?” Angelica asked. “Why do you need her to do anything?”

“Promise…Gel, I mean it, promise not to tell anyone if I tell you this,” Junior warned, and Angelica had a bad feeling in her stomach. She’d had the beginning of this conversation before, and it never ended well. “You’ve gotta let me tell people about it on my own, but I can’t…I can’t, anymore, I can’t just…suffer in silence. Not anymore.”

“I don’t like keeping secrets,” Angelica said, “but I’m a little surprised you were able to.”

Junior snorted, but still looked at her expectantly. Angelica sighed deeply.

“Yes, alright, fine,” she said. “I won’t tell a soul. What’s wrong with you?”

He told her.

Angelica wasn’t aware of jumping to her feet but she must’ve done, because by the end of Junior’s explanation she was stalking the stream bank with itchy hands that felt like they were about to go up in flame any second.

“What is with our family?” she cried when Junior had laid out the scope of his horrible “internship” with Hastur. “Why are you all a bunch of secretive self-sacrificing little idiots?”

“Like you would’ve done anything differently,” Junior said, quirking his mouth, and Angelica narrowed her eyes at him. “It’s…I think it’s gonna be okay, actually. Now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I told Rosa,” Junior said, and seemed to need to take a minute. “I did. I told her. And. Messing with me…is against the contract.”

“There’s no guarantee that Hell will honor it,” Angelica warned. “There’s—there’s nothing _tangible_ about these contracts, it’s just words on a page—”

“It’s a new law of the universe,” a new voice said, and Rosa stepped out from behind the willow tree, looking haggard but smiling. “I know what I’m doing. With the agreement of the executives from both Heaven _and_ Hell, my contract is as binding as the Almighty’s word. Breakage of contract has consequences. It’s not just words on a page, it’s a supernatural force backed up with occult and ethereal ichor, and it _will_ hold.”

“You talked to them,” Junior said, and Rosa glanced at Angelica before sitting by Junior, arranging her skirts in that fussy way of hers. Angelica was about to sit before she heard another engine approaching, and turned to see Datura’s Sprite coming up the dirt path. She smiled despite herself.

“I talked to them,” Rosa agreed. “Hastur will be found, and his punishment will be swift and ruthless. I have Dagon’s word on that.”

“I have a concern, though,” Angelica said, and waited for Datura and Clem to pull up and park and exit their car before continuing her thought. “Well, before I say anything…hey, you two.”

“What’s up?” Datura asked, depositing themself and Clem on the banks of the stream. Clem unwound from around them and circled Junior instead, laying his great head in Junior’s lap.

“Junior’s been stalked and tortured by Hastur for months,” Angelica said, and Datura said a series of words that had once gotten a glowing smile of pride from Father as Azirafather fussed. Clem curled up tighter around Junior, who huffed a laugh at the coils and coils of snake pressed around him. 

“Thanks,” Junior said wryly, looking up at Angelica, who shrugged.

“Rosa thinks Hastur’s gonna face judgement for breaking her fun little contract,” Angelica continued, “but my thought is, he’s been breaking it this long, what’s gonna stop him from continuing to break it?”

“Well, I have a thought, myself,” Rosa said, looking up at Angelica but keeping her hand on Junior’s shoulder. “It’s…a bit dangerous.”

“Well, you’ve been leaving us out of the fun up until now, might as well hear it,” Datura said, and Rosa grinned.

 _Does it involve coil-crushing?_ Clem asked.

“It might,” Rosa said. “Hear me out.”

Angelica, for once, did. By the end of Rosa’s idea, she was smiling wider than she had in months.

“That’s good,” she said. “Dangerous, but good.”

“Will only work with all of us, I think,” Rosa said, looking to Datura. “Are you okay with that?”

“If it protects Anthony, I’m in,” Datura nodded.

 _Count me in,_ Clem said. _I’ve been ready for this since I found out about your arrangement, Rosa._

“I…I can’t ask you lot to do that for me,” Junior said, his voice rusty, and Angelica put him in an affectionate headlock, kissing the top of his head.

“You’re not asking,” she said. “We’re doing it.”

“Father and Azirafather really won’t like it,” Rosa said, “but they don’t like much of anything I do anymore, really. And it’ll fix everything.”

“Better to ask forgiveness than permission,” Angelica said. Then she snaked out, winding across Junior’s shoulders. _We’ve got you, Anthony. Always have, always will._

Junior snaked down, too, then Datura, then Rosa.

 _I love all of you,_ Junior said quietly as Clem surrounded the lot of them, big and safe as Father had ever been.

 _Next time, don’t take so long to ask us for help,_ Angelica said, nudging his snoot with her own. _Dummy._

  
  



	13. Round and Round: From Paris With Love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time for our exciting conclusion! This chapter more than the others is a true collaborative effort; amuse yourselves and see if you can tell who wrote which bits, but welcome to the end of the Round and Round arc, y'all!

“All right,” Rosa said, tying her hair back in a practical tail. “We can’t wait for him to show up. We need to all be ready.”

_ I am afraid that you mean what I think you mean _ , Clem said.

“If you think I mean summoning him, you deserve a juicy baby bunny.”

_ Maybe two?  _ Clem said hopefully. Datura laughed despite the anxiety.

“You’re going to summon him?” Angelica said. “You’re certifiable. The house and environs are warded; Father and Azirafather saw to that, and they renew them regularly.”

“You’re right about that,” Rosa said. Angelica had a split second to blink in astonishment at her sister’s agreement. “I, however, have the unique advantage of knowing how Azirafather and Father weave energy, because they taught me how to do it. On top of their own protections, I also know how to navigate Anathema’s additions, especially since Father and Azirafather started taking over their maintenance. And the wards aren’t designed to keep my power from moving through them. Which means I can slip through the gaps and drag him here.”

Junior tried to fight a shudder. Datura reached a hand out and gripped his shoulder securely.

“What will happen when you drag him through the wards?” Angelica demanded. Rosa hesitated for a moment, then said,

“The wards will likely resist him for a moment, but then they’ll… stop working, I think. Or maybe not. When I asked him about it while gathering information about containing occult energy, Azirafather said that Father had accidentally brought Hastur’s maggot in through the wards himself when we were little, and nothing happened then.”

“Objection,” Junior said, and Angelica snorted.

“Nothing happened to the  _ wards _ ,” Rosa clarified. “We all had the dickens terrified out of us—”

“ _ Listen _ to yourself,” Angelica said, “do you ever actually  _ hear _ the words coming out of your mouth?”

“—but the fact remains that Hastur coming through was masked by Father’s own energy,” Rosa said, visibly fighting the urge to stick her tongue out at her sister.

Datura watched their siblings bicker in a way they hadn’t bickered for a while. It was a teasing kind of bickering, the kind they had engaged in prior to the last couple of years. Everyone had to change; nothing stayed the same, Datura knew that. Every time their siblings came home, though, they were even less like they’d been before they’d moved out. And now Rosa was heading an attack against a Duke of Hell, who had been grinding Anthony down over months for the crime of being Father’s son and looking too much like him. It was… a big thing, beyond anything they could have imagined. Datura had never been so glad they hadn’t moved out, past the wards. At the same time… they were all together again. Talking again.

“We’re all still in on this?” Rosa said, looking around and meeting everyone’s eyes. “I can’t do this alone.”

“Hear that?” Angelica said. “Cherish this moment, friends, because the likelihood that Rosa will ever say this again is next to nil.”

“Yes, Rosa,” Datura said, trying not to smile. “You have us with you all the way.”

“You have my sword,” Junior joked weakly.

“Oh, hey,” Angelica said, her brow furrowed. “My old fencing stuff is in the box room. Does anyone want an épée?” 

“You’re the only one who can use one safely at this point, I think, Gel,” Datura said. “And… I don’t think physical weapons are going to be of much use.”

“They can be comforting, though,” Junior said. “Trust me, you don’t want to face him with just your hands.”

“Anthony,” Rosa said softly. “Your hands are talented. You can draw beautiful things. You can pot a cutting and prune a shrub. And I know your soul is gentle, but you do have the same kind of power in that soul as I have. We all do.” She held a hand out to her siblings and turned it over so the palm was up. White-silver flickers began to dance there. “Trust me. Trust  _ us _ .”

Junior watched the power collected in her palm, blinking. Datura felt him tremble. Then he slowly lifted his own hand and closed his eyes. The air around it began to waver as if heat was stirring it, and then the shimmers turned into green tendrils weaving in and out between his long fingers.

_ I haven’t played this game for years,  _ Clem said, and sparks of gold danced on his scales. Angelica smiled fiercely and lifted both hands, blue flowing down her forearms and pulsing at her fingertips. Datura moved their hand from Junior’s shoulder and held their palms facing each other, concentrating. They felt the odd dual sensation of pushing and relaxing at the same time, and blackish-purple light zigzagged from one hand to the other and back again.

_ Just like when Father and Azirafather taught us to protect ourselves _ . Clem drew himself up, his coils thickening until he was admirably enormous, allowing his full size to manifest. 

“Well,” Datura said. “Innate power is all well and good, but if no one minds, I’m going to grab something heavy to hit with as well.”

“Shovel?” Junior suggested. “Or was it a hoe Father used to beat him to death that one time in the garden?” Datura grinned.

“I have an even better idea.”

“Is everyone ready?” Rosa said. They all looked at one another. “Remember, this ride does not stop until it’s done. No one gets off halfway through. Once that circle goes up, no angel or demon can cross it. That includes us.”

“Do it,” Junior said, shaking visibly now. “Now. If we wait any longer I’ll lose my nerve. I’m going to be the weak link in this anyhow.”

_ Anthony _ , said Clem.  _ You could never be a weak anything. You held up under this alone for months. You’re stronger than you think. _

Junior looked over at him, and gave him a shaky nod. Clem nodded back firmly.

“I’m going to need your help shielding this from the dads,” Rosa said, picking a long stick up from the wall by the orchard. “Once I get going power will be moving, and then disturbing me would be… ill-advised.”

“We’ll do what we can,” Angelica said. Rosa nodded and started drawing on the ground with her stick.

“Are you seriously using a stick to make complicated magical symbols on the grass?” Angelica said. Rosa paused and shot a dark look at her.

“I’m doing most of it inside my head, which is harder, if you must know. But yes, I am using a  _ stick _ on the  _ grass _ like we used to do as kids. Do you have any more criticisms? Because if you do, please share them now and get them done with so I can move along with the rather important and convoluted demon summoning.”

“Oh, I have criticisms. I have criticisms galore,” Angelica said cheerfully. Junior laughed. 

_ It’s so nice that you’re talking to one another again _ , said Clem, and then Datura had to laugh, too.

“Do you think Father and Azirafather used to snark like this at one another when trying to work?” they said.

“I love you all, shut up,” Rosa said. “I’m brilliant and highly skilled, but I’m fairly certain you want me to succeed in crafting a rock-solid summoning and bonding in this specific case.”

“Uh, yes please,” Junior said. “I’m... I’m just going to sit down for a bit. To, um, conserve my strength.” And he sank to his knees, breathing deeply.

Rosa watched him for a moment, and he sighed in irritation.

“Just do it, Rosa. I’m… well, I’m not fine, am I. But I’m as good as I’ll get.”

“Right,” she said. She drew another symbol in the grass, then dropped the stick and closed her eyes. “Cover me,” she said.

None of the children were home, it turned out. Rosa had already gone, leaving her note; Junior was off who knew where. The Sprite went missing at some point, and when Crowley pushed open Angelica’s door her room was empty.

With Aziraphale still fragile and full of self-recrimination, he didn’t mention it when he returned to their bedroom with a tray of tea things and biscuits. He had tucked Aziraphale back into bed and held him for a few hours, both of them mourning and working through myriad other emotions. Everything had come apart in less than twelve hours. 

He poured a cup of tea and added more sugar than usual before offering it to the angel. Aziraphale accepted it with a wan smile.

“You take such good care of me, darling,” he said. Crowley fiddled with the sugar tongs.

“Managed to mess up a couple of perfectly good kids, though,” he said. “Always thought Angelica would be the troublesome one, you know. Best of both of us, I said just after we named her. Turned out to be the quiet fussy one with a finger in both pies.”

“Well, it’s the quiet fussy ones you need to watch out for,” Aziraphale said with a straight face. “It’s because no one ever suspects them.”

Crowley chortled and handed his husband a biscuit. It felt good to laugh, but he also felt guilty.

Aziraphale sighed.

“All those years of study and theoretical what-ifs. I was so delighted that she was interested in angelic magic. She loved going deep into meaning and application, and God help me, I loved her for it. What she’s done with it, though… Crowley, I can’t fathom it.”

“Well, she’s an utter knockout at it,” Crowley pointed out. “The way she was handling that manifestation and blessing?”

“It was rather good,” Aziraphale agreed, and nibbled at his biscuit. “I wonder… I wonder if she is as good at the other stuff.”

Crowley swallowed against a queer feeling in his throat.

“I can’t imagine her working for Hell,” he said. “Not in any way, shape, or form. I can’t even believe her capable.”

“You’ll have to ask her,” Aziraphale said quietly. “You’ll have to talk to her about the kinds of things she’s handling.”

Crowley ran a hand through his hair.

“I know,” he admitted. “I may not be able to interfere or take this from her, but I can be there for her when she needs grounding or emotional decompression. She has too much of a conscience to do this without needing psychological support.”

“But we can’t make it seem like we’re trying to push ourselves in where we’re not wanted.” Aziraphale put down the biscuit and looked miserable. “I may never be able to talk with her again like we used to. I said such terrible things.”

“You were scared, angel.”

“I was furious,” Aziraphale said in an even lower tone. “I was righteous and I thundered at her. Rosa. Our Rosa.”

“Angel.” Crowley moved the tray and let the angel rest his head against his sharp shoulder, putting his arm around him.. “You can’t keep retreading the same ground. You lost your temper. Parents do that when they see their kids do dangerous stuff, no matter what their age. We just… have to apologize.”

Aziraphale sighed.

“To forgive is Divine, after all,” he said.

“Well, she’s part angel,” said Crowley. 

“I don’t know how much longer I can cover you,” Angelica said. She glanced at Datura, who nodded in agreement.

“Are you almost done?” they asked. Rosa, who had been standing in the middle of the symbols she had drawn in the grass, eyes closed, nodded slowly.

“Close,” she said. “Circle raising in three… two… one.”

A susurration of energy whispered around them, and a tangible feeling of thickness sprang up. Rosa opened her eyes.

“Now for the fun part,” she said, stretching her fingers. “Stand back, everyone.”

The other backed closer to the outer edge of the circle, forming a loose arc around where Junior knelt on the grass. 

“And heads up,” she added. “I can bring Hastur, but dragging him through the wards will probably alert Father and Azirafather. There’s nothing I can do about that.”

_ Do it,  _ Clem said.

Rosa took a deep breath and stretched out her hands. She began speaking, and the words made Datura’s spine crawl. Junior shook harder, lifting his hands to cover his ears. Angelica squinted against the demonic incantation but stood her ground. Clem wound himself back and forth behind Rosa, leaning against her back to reassure and support her.

“He’s coming,” Rosa whispered a split second before there was an almighty rip in reality, and a struggling shape formed on the ground in front of them, bound with eerie green rings of energy.

“Hello, Duke Hastur,” Rosa said, her voice strangely layered as if she was speaking in different places at once. “We’re so glad you could join us for an employee review. HR has agreed to assign me your disciplinary action for contravention of a contract.”

Crowley dropped the tea tray on his way out of the bedroom, and Aziraphale started right out of bed.

“The wards,” he said wildly as Crowley snarled. “Where are the children?”

“Not here, they’re safe—”

“Wait,” Aziraphale said, stiffening. “Crowley, something’s—”

“Back garden,” he snapped and leapt over the shattered porcelain and mess of cold tea and crumbs. 

“Contravention of what contract?” the demon wheezed in a gravelly voice. 

“The contract I signed with Lord Dagon.”

Hastur blinked his cold black eyes.

“It specifically states that there will be no interference with my family.” Rosa smiled a very cold smile. “And yet I hear that you… took on an intern.”

Hastur began to laugh, a rusty, wild cackle that had Junior trembling so hard he thought he’d pass out.

“My business is my business,” Hastur ground out. “Whatever deal Dagon made with you has no meaning for me, or Little Crowley.”

“You’re wrong.” Rosa lifted a hand and there was a piece of paper in it. “This clause holds all denizens of Hell to this contract. If you had run it past your head office, as you were supposed to instead of going after people associated with individuals you were told to leave alone after Armageddon derailed and execution failed, you’d have been told that under no circumstances were you to interact with this family in any way. But you chose to act on your own, launch a pet project, and now you have to deal with the consequences, Duke Hastur.”

“And who is going to provide those consequences? You?” Hastur laughed again, a creaky scraping sound. “Little girl, fluttery angel. You can’t stand against a Duke of Hell.”

“Incoming,” Angelica said.

The back door of the cottage blew open, and an angel and a demon crashed out. 

“Hastur!” Crowley shouted. And then—

“Children?” Aziraphale cried.

_ It’s all right, Azirafather, _ Clem said. 

Rosa looked over towards their parents.

“Please don’t interfere. Remember, you can’t.”

“Rosa, no,” Aziraphale said wildly. “Please, we can talk—”

“Oh, Azirafather,” she said, stepping away from the bound demon and closer to her fathers. “I love you. I love you both, so much. I have to take care of something, though. Hastur has been in breach of contract, and poor Anthony has been bearing the pain of it. We’re going to make sure that stops.”

“ _ Junior _ ?” Crowley said. Aziraphale made some sort of indecipherable sound and lunged toward where they stood. Crowley leapt into motion, following him, the words  _ Anthony has been bearing the pain of it  _ clanging loudly in his head and heart. His eyes went to where his eldest son knelt on the ground, his back to them.

“Rosa, stop!” Aziraphale shouted. But then he pulled up so quickly that Crowley nearly ran into his back, stumbling aside at the last minute.

“What— what have you—”

“I’m sorry, Azirafather,” Rosa said from behind the ripple of magic in the air, and turned away.

“ _ Rosa _ !” he shouted. His daughter walked away from him, her shoulders thrown back and her head high. “Rosa, take this circle down right now!”

Datura looked over their shoulder at him regretfully. Aziraphale felt a shudder of power rattle through him, fought it wildly for a moment, and then gave in. His children were in that circle, trapped with a demon—a demon who had haunted their family for years, a demon with a grudge—and he was on the  _ outside _ .

The shudder of power rattled him again, and with a burst of raw emotion he released it against the circle his daughter had raised.

“Aziraphale!” Crowley said, grabbing his arm. Aziraphale snarled and threw his arm back, tossing his husband’s hand away. 

“ _ Aziraphale! _ ” Crowley repeated from where he’d stumbled to a halt, the force having moved more than his arm back. The angel ignored him and beat at the circle again. Waves of shock exploded forth every time he bashed at it, his angelic power against Rosa’s carefully, methodically constructed defense of demonic, angelic, and whatever energy the children carried of their own.

“Angel!” Crowley grasped both of his shoulders from behind. “You can’t do it this way!”

Aziraphale turned swiftly, picking Crowley up and throwing him back. The demon landed against the side of the greenhouse, one of the large panes cracking as he slid to the ground. The angel didn’t see; he had turned back to the circle.

Crowley sat there, dazed, for a moment or two. Aziraphale was cracking with energy, his eyes the eldritch blue that the demon had so rarely seen. Flickers of multiple wings, eyes, and flames came in and out of view around the angel’s body. Aziraphale was losing his hold on his celestial nature, pushed to it by his terror for the safety of his children.

Crowley got to his feet dizzily. Aziraphale had moved right up to the circle and was digging his fingers into it, trying to pry it open with his bare hands. Crowley staggered toward the circle, avoiding the angel.

Inside, the five children had spread out, standing in a loose semi-circle across from Hastur, Junior in the middle, slowly getting to his feet. A shudder ran down Crowley’s sinuous spine. 

To his right Aziraphale was snarling in Enochian, trying to unmake the circle that Rosa had raised. It added to the ringing in Crowley’s ears.

“Spawn,” he croaked. “Spawn, let us in.”

“We can’t, Father,” Datura said, hefting something that looked like the spare tyre iron from the garage in their hand. “I’m sorry. You’re bound to non-interference by the contract, just as Hell and Heaven are.”

“For Someone’s sake,” he shouted hoarsely. “Hastur’s already broken the blessed contract.”

_ Father,  _ Clem said clearly.  _ You can’t protect us this time. _

“The Heaven I can’t,” he snapped, and added his power to Aziraphale’s, trying to find a chink in the circle.

“Little Crowley,” Hastur gloated, struggling in his bonds. “Brought your baby brothers and pretty sisters to play, have you. Got them to believe your lies, to pity you. All in one place for me. Now I’m going to take all of them apart with my teeth, bit by bit, and bind your hands with their entrails before I gouge out your eyes. All while your precious fathers watch.”

Crowley realized that he was screaming, screaming so hard that his throat was already in shreds. His power was sliding right off Rosa’s circle. Inside, he saw Junior shaking so hard that he almost staggered.

Angelica brought her right hand out and to the side, and in her hand he saw a silver épée shimmer into existence. She flicked it, and blue flame began to dance along the narrow blade. Beside him he heard Aziraphale take in a sudden, sharp breath.

“Wait!” Crowley shouted wildly. Angelica looked over her shoulder.

“Oh, Father,” she said, her pale streak of hair coiling loose from her braid, playing across her eyes. “We can’t let you in. We love you. I’m sorry,” she added, and for a moment Crowley wondered why.

Then she inhaled, closed her eyes, lifted her left hand, and snapped her fingers.

All five of his children vanished, along with Hastur, and Crowley felt the twist of reality that was his daughter placing her will through a fold in time, pinning it in place so that the moment froze. He barely had time to open his mouth for a final agonizing scream before everything stopped.

  
  


Liminal spaces are by definition transient; what they look like for one being is not what they may look like for another. For the Serpent of Eden, the space between seconds looked like the shifting sands of the view around the Garden, the place where he met his better half. For his daughter, it looked like a grassy field not out of place in pastoral southern England, the place she first learned how powerful she could be. 

Junior remembered the place well, it being the first time he learned of his own mortality. He let Datura help him to his feet and stared down at Hastur, who was very close to bursting from the thinning bands of power keeping him in place. 

“We finish it quickly, no making meals of it,” Rosa said, her clear voice sharp and cold, white fire licking her fingers. “On three?”

“You pathetic little worms,” Hastur cackled as one of the bands of power burst. Junior glared at him, hateful and grubby, and felt coils of green fire bunching around his arms. 

“One,” Angelica said, flourishing her flaming rapier, the blue light dancing along the blade.

_ Two, _ Clem said, opening his mouth and hissing, his fangs huge and as he concentrated first dripping with venom, then with slick golden drops of fire.

“Three,” Datura said, and their tyre iron crackled to life with void-purple flame.

They pounced just as the final band of power broke, and several things happened at once:

First, Clem shot forward and wrapped Hastur up in his crushing thick body, sinking his golden-fire fangs deep into Hastur’s side. 

Second, Angelica stabbed her magically sharpened épée into the center of Hastur’s hellfire-cloaked palm before it could touch Clem, pinning his hand to the ground, her own blue fire enveloping his entire arm and burning it away.

Third, Junior and Rosa both let their fire stream towards Hastur, Rosa’s in rapid bursts and Junior’s in thick drilling vines.

Fourth, Datura conked him across the face with the tyre iron with a satisfying  _ clunk _ as he went to bite the coil closest to him; Hastur’s flat black eyes rolled in his head from the impact.

Hastur began screaming as a rainbow inferno enveloped him, dancing lightly over Clem’s body and digging fiercely into Hastur’s. He smoked and billowed as he began melting away. All attempts at conjuring hellfire were eaten back and away by his would-be victims’ purer flames, neither Hellish nor Heavenly, not even truly Earthly, but something else altogether—a mix of all three, maybe, or of none.

“I’ll be back,” Hastur howled even as his vocal cords burned away. “You can’t stop me from coming! I’ll rip all of you to shreds and eat you, I’ll—I’ll turn you all into boots!”

_ Leave us alone, _ Clem hissed, and his coils gave a vicious spasmic twist.

Hastur exploded in a mess of goo and ash, which was quickly consumed by the remaining fires of Junior and his siblings. Junior stared at the space where Hastur had been, hardly daring to believe his eyes

“Did…did that work?” he croaked, and felt Angelica slip under his arm, supporting him as he swayed on his feet. Datura got under his other arm, and Rosa walked across the scorched earth towards him, Clem following.

“I think it worked,” Rosa smiled.

“I’m going to let the bubble down,” Angelica warned as the magic circle depowered, its intended victim gone. “Be prepared for dad conniptions.”

Now that it was quiet, they could hear Father and Azirafather still trying to get in, but…slower, somehow. Junior leaned more heavily on Datura and nodded.

Angelica snapped her fingers, and the meadow of her little secret getaway from the passage of time melted away. In the split-second before an avenging angel and a frantic demon descended upon them, Junior felt the sun on his face and thought, it’s an awfully nice day, isn’t it?

Then their already-existing knot of siblings was smashed in between four wings, four arms, and two bodies, Father touching heads and arms and checking them over for signs of injury, Azirafather gathering as many of them into his arms as would fit and those that wouldn’t fit there fit in the span of his wings. Both were babbling at top-speeds and were hard to understand before Junior realized they weren’t speaking English in the first place—he was picking up some Hebrew, some Latin, a little bit of Assyrian swearing. It was rare that Father and Azirafather lost control to the point of not having a singular command over their powers of speech.

“Reckless—pudding-headed—dangerous—don’t you ever,  _ ever _ do that to us again—” Azirafather bellowed.

“—could have killed you all and we never would’ve found the bodies, where’s Hastur, I’m going to kill him myself—” Father yelled over the top of him. Junior looked at Rosa, who smiled and took a deep breath, then exuded a palpable air of calm. Junior gave into it willingly. Father fought it, blinking, but ultimately let his grip on Junior’s shoulder relax. Azirafather lashed back with his own aura, his face reddened.

“Don’t you dare,” Azirafather snapped. “Where’s Hastur? Where is he?”

“I think we smote him,” Angelica said, and Junior almost laughed at the look on Azirafather’s face. His solid hands flexed from where he was gripping his children close.

“You…what?”

“We smote him,” Rosa repeated. “All together, I think we might equal one angel or so.”

_ I crushed him good, _ Clem said proudly.

“He’s gone,” Junior said, and staggered under the lightness the realization brought him. “He’s gone. He’s gone, I’m never having those dreams again, he’s  _ gone _ .”

“Dreams?” Father said sharply. Junior smiled at him. He could’ve napped for a month.

“Why don’t we have some tea,” Angelica said, “and we’ll tell you all about it?”

Azirafather was still looking puffed up like a war bird, but Father’s wings disappeared and let some sunlight back into the knot of them. He quirked a grin at Azirafather.

“I’ll get the kettle on, shall I?” he said. Azirafather held out for another few seconds before releasing a breath and deflating with it, banishing his wings.

“My dears,” Azirafather said, “I would love it if you would tell me what’s been happening. I don’t think I quite understand. And.” He fiddled with his fingers and glanced a few times at Rosa, who was smiling steadily at him. “It. It would be nice. To have a quiet moment together. All of us.”

“Last one in’s a rotten egg,” Junior said, and Datura cuffed him.

“You can barely stand up, you idiot, stop that,” they said fondly. Navigating the door when the seven of them refused to separate from each other was awkward, but they made it work. They always did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're thinking that there are far too many loose ends for this to be the end of the matter, you would be correct. Things so rarely end with neat bows on top.
> 
> In discussing this, Olwen and I have been calling it the Rosabomb, after the manner of Steven Universe's Stevenbombs, where Cartoon Network would release a batch of episodes over a week around a central theme and the last episode of the 'bomb would wrap up the major plot bits but still leave a lot of the smaller character threads for future episodes to take hold of. I hope you have enjoyed the Rosabomb, and know that this is far from the end of things. We have many more things in store for you in the future, some of them reconciliations, some of them new beginnings, some of them having nothing to do with The New Arrangement and adult snabies at all. 
> 
> Thank you so much for coming with us on this journey. We love and cherish your comments and companionship as we drag each other and the rest of the Wiggleverse through the hard places XD Stay safe. Stay healthy. Wash your hands and stay at home if you can. Love you guys!


	14. Out of Step

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are back to normal... only they're not. What constitutes normal after something like the Fell-Crowley family just went through? 
> 
> People have a lot to sort through. Especially the Ineffable Dads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Timeline notes: This takes place not long after the first chapter of Third Eden, [Finding Home](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23770906/chapters/57098272).
> 
> This chapter also reveals couple of facts that we couldn't point out earlier because they'd have undermined the action. You may have already figured them out if you thought about the climax of the last chapter, because of how canon has laid out how supernatural creatures react to certain events.

As the weeks went by, they tried to settle into their lives again. And on the surface, things seemed the same. Datura and Clem did their usual daily things, Datura heading out to the shop they’d apprenticed with, Clem surreptitiously reading psychology textbooks and looking up distance learning possibilities for counselling training. Aziraphale puttered around the house. And Crowley watched them all, waiting.

The only thing that was different was that Junior was back home. Not that it was a significant change from what it had been when Junior had lived in the city. He rarely left his room.

But... there was a pall over the house. Everyone stepped carefully. Datura laughed out loud at something one day, then caught themselves. 

It was, Crowley observed, almost as if someone had died.

The whole point was, however, that they’d survived.

Only it didn’t quite feel that way. After the debriefing and hugs and tears and tearful admonishments, when everyone had felt dizzyingly relieved… Rosa was gone the next morning, another polite note left on the kitchen table, with a subtext of dealing with a broken heart. Angelica stayed two more days, then had to go back to the city for the resumption of class. And Junior… well. Everyone had to heal from trauma in their own ways.

So Crowley watched, and waited.

He waited for almost two months, watching the children, watching his husband. Aziraphale was not someone who moved quickly. Crowley had six thousand years of experience coping with that particular quirk. The angel needed time to sort through his emotions. All well and good, but the children didn’t operate on the same timeline. Theirs was much more akin to the human scale, possibly accelerated since they’d leapt into maturity so quickly. Their emotions needed to be dealt with in a different span of time. They couldn’t wait a thousand years or two.

And so Crowley waited and watched, looking for a moment where he judged the angel was through his initial processing of the familial disaster. 

It came one night after everyone else was asleep. Crowley was sprawled on the sofa. Aziraphale was puttering about the room, poking at the fire, fluffing and rearranging pillows, folding and refolding blankets and afghans and lap rugs, generally leaving everything as disordered as it had been in the first place. It wasn’t a cheerful fussing. It was restless, and melancholy, and a classic demonstration of the angel displacing his discomfort.

“You’re moping,” Crowley said.

“I’m not,” was Aziraphale’s immediate response. Then he sighed. “I’m not… moping. I’m… something else that isn’t moping.”

“If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck,” Crowley said. Aziraphale harrumphed. “What are you dwelling on that is making you not-mope, then?”

Aziraphale fussed with the knickknacks on the mantel.

“It’s nothing, dear.”

“Course. Nothing.” Crowley patted the sofa, next to where he sat. “C'mon, angel.”

Aziraphale sniffed but settled on the sofa. Crowley pivoted, swinging his legs up and over the armrest, and lay back, his head in his husband’s lap. Aziraphale sighed and began gently running his fingers along the waves of hair across his thigh, resting his other hand on Crowley’s hip. Crowley closed his eyes.

“Datura seems to be enjoying their apprenticeship,” he said, beginning with a casual, neutral topic. Aziraphale made a noise of general agreement. “Mind you, that’s not a surprise. We knew that was the right thing as soon as they suggested it.”

“The beef Wellington they made this weekend was divine,” Aziraphale murmured.

“A far cry from kippers in raspberry jelly sandwiches,” Crowley said, and Aziraphale laughed. 

“Datura certainly has come a long way, haven’t they.”

“All of them have,” Crowley said. He noted the microsecond of hesitation in the hair stroking. Ah. He waited a few heartbeats, then said,

“Heard from the girls?”

Another microsecond-long pause of the fingers.

“Angelica texted. Her last exam went well enough.”

“Good for her. Any news on what she plans to do over summer hols?”

“Nothing yet. I do hope she comes home.”

“For a week or so, at least,” Crowley agreed. Then: “Nothing from—?”

“No.”

The fire in the hearth crackled. Crowley waited.

“I….” Aziraphale seemed to be looking for words. “I miss her,” he said finally. His voice was sad, which was such a little word to convey the depths of pain it was meant to describe.

“Yeah.” Crowley reached a hand up to brush a finger along the angel’s cheek.

“I don’t know which is worse,” Aziraphale said. “Not hearing from Rosa in the city, or Junior, who is here but… not here.”

Crowley moved his hand down to rest gently on Aziraphale’s, lacing their fingers together. He lifted the resulting knot to rest on his chest.

“At least we can keep an eye on Junior,” he said. Aziraphale looked down, raising an eyebrow.

“Really,” he said. “Then you know where he goes, what he does? Now that he comes out of his room, that is, leaves in the morning and doesn’t come back till night?”

Crowley sighed.

“We can keep an eye on his energy.”

“Barely,” Aziraphale said, looking back at the fire. “And we did a terrible job of that before. Enough that the poor boy was stalked somehow, and we never knew.”

Crowley felt his heart lurch.

“For all our experience at dodging them, we’ve managed to fail at keeping two of our own children safe from our old bosses,” he said. “That’s… not something to be proud of, is it.”

Aziraphale’s fingers spasmed, pressing Crowley’s tightly.

“On the other hand,” the angel replied, “they went out of their way to make sure that we _didn’t_ know.”

Crowley grinned at the indignance in Aziraphale’s voice.

“Our canny spawn,” he said. Aziraphale looked down at him in irritation.

“They’re not supposed to use their cleverness against _us_ ,” he said. Crowley snorted.

“Pretty sure that this is a classic parenting thing. I seem to remember someone lying outright to the Almighty.”

Aziraphale sniffed and went back to staring at the fire.

“And that someone turned out just fine,” Crowley said softly.

“Oh, Crowley.” Aziraphale sighed sadly. “I don’t know how to fix this.”

“First of all,” Crowley said, rearranging his gangly limbs to be more comfortable, “you _don’t_ fix it. _We_ don’t fix it. They’re on their own paths, of their own choosing. I think all we can do is let them know we’re here and will support them however we can.”

Aziraphale sighed.

“Surely they know that already?”

“Knowing and _knowing_ are are two different things, angel,” Crowley pointed out.

Aziraphale fidgeted some more.

“Angel,” Crowley said. “She needs it spelled out for her.”

Aziraphale didn’t say anything.

“Oh, for someone’s sake,” Crowley grumbled. “Angel. She’s your daughter. I guarantee that she’s overthinking and worried and certain that you’ll never speak to her again. It’s been two months. She will absolutely, positively, _not_ make the first move.”

Aziraphale’s lips were a white line, his jaw set.

“It would help us to know exactly what happened,” Crowley pressed gently. “All they told us was that Rosa had dispensation from Hell to mete out Hastur’s punishment. We don’t know why Hastur risked breaking the rules outlined in her contract. We don’t even know exactly _what_ he did to Junior, or for how long. And frankly, despite the gaping lacuna that has opened between the two of you, Rosa is our best bet at obtaining that information.”

Aziraphale closed his eyes and was silent. Crowley decided to let him have the space he needed to sort through his new snarl of feelings, and stood up, heading for the brandy snifter. He poured two glasses and brought them back, holding one out to his husband. After a moment Aziraphale opened his eyes, and took the brandy with a small nod of thanks. Crowley turned and sank into the other end of the sofa, curling his spine into the crack between the armrest and the back, his legs stretched out in front of him, angled toward the angel. He swallowed some brandy, then said,

“When are we going to tell them?”

“Pardon?”

“When are we going to tell them.” Crowley kicked a foot, staring into the fire.

“Tell them… oh.”

Crowley glanced at Aziraphale, who sighed.

“Not unless there was holy water involved,” the angel said, understanding what Crowley meant. “And as brilliant and clever as our children are…”

“Holy water isn’t something they can do.”

“As far as we know,” Aziraphale said quietly. Crowley groaned.

“Don’t, angel. Just… let’s assume they can’t.”

“Rosa might.” Aziraphale knit his fingers together around his brandy glass.

“On a regular basis?” Crowley pressed. “Or as part of her… assignments?”

“Mm. I see what you mean. You think Heaven might give her… an allowance of miracle power for the jobs she does on their behalf.”

“I’m almost certain that she couldn’t pull off a manifestation and blessing like she did in Paris without outside help.” Crowley made a face. “Which means I have to entertain the notion that Hell does the same, and that makes me all ragey, so let’s ignore that for now.”

“They said all of them together would equal one angel,” Aziraphale said, turning the problem over in his mind. “But they lack the actual tie to Heaven that would empower them.”

“Holy water,” Crowley repeated. “From what they said, it wasn’t involved. Which means….”

“Hastur was discorporated. Not destroyed.”

“That’s what I thought.” Crowley closed his eyes.

“Holy water is the only thing that destroys demons,” Aziraphale said.

“Hellfire is the only thing that destroys angels,” Crowley confirmed.

“The children’s flame manifestations aren’t hellfire,” Aziraphale said thoughtfully. “It’s more of a product of how they visualize their power. Part of the problem is that even _we_ don’t know what they’re capable of. We're far beyond doing simple exercises in the back garden. How much reality can they reshape?”

“They can control their bodies,” Crowley said. “Angelica has shown flashes of being able to exert her will over time in extreme situations and moments of incredible stress.”

“Junior…” Aziraphale said. Crowley shrugged. “He’s never really shown an interest, has he.”

“He communes with the Bentley,” Crowley offered. “That’s partly due to her, of course.”

They sat quietly, listening to the embers pop in the grate. Aziraphale looked at Crowley, sprawled on the sofa next to him. 

“Will he be back, do you think?”

Crowley shrugged again, not needing the angel to identify who he was referring to.

“Not if he knows what’s good for him,” he said darkly.

“Hastur does not hold a stellar track record in that particular department.”

Crowley snorted.

“On the other hand,” Aziraphale said, “with Rosa’s… arrangement….”

“You think Hell might keep him on a shorter leash?” Crowley rubbed his chin. “S’possible, I suppose. Then again, it’s Hastur. Not so clever on the uptake.”

“Except when it comes to getting into the head of our eldest,” Aziraphale said, a streak of steel creeping into his tone.

“They were _brilliant_ ,” Crowley said, smiling fiercely at the fire. “They closed ranks and discorporated him. Once they knew what was going on, they pulled together to defend Junior. And… on their own. Without us.”

“The clever clogs,” Aziraphale said smugly. Crowley squinted at him in amusement.

“Pride’s a sin, angel.”

“I rather think it’s been proven by now that we appear to be outside the standard rubric of sin and virtue,” Aziraphale said, and leaned over to kiss him.

“So then, angel,” Crowley said after Aziraphale had settled back and sipped more brandy. “You’ll contact her?”

Aziraphale sighed.

“Why can’t you do it?”

Crowley looked at him with reproach.

“That’s unworthy of you, angel. Also, I’m not the one having the breakdown of communication with her. She feels that she’s hurt you specifically. I’m just collateral damage.”

“Collateral damage,” Aziraphale snorted. “You’re her _father_.” Crowley waved his glass.

“You know what I mean.”

Aziraphale closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again.

“All right. Yes. I’ll… I’ll write her a note. I promise.”

Crowley laid his hand on the sofa between them. Without looking, Aziraphale extended his own hand to cover it.


	15. Let Us Not Burthen Our Remembrance with a Heaviness That’s Gone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley has convinced Aziraphale to reach out to Rosa. Aziraphale has anxiety about the whole idea, but he did make a promise...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gentle readers, some timeline context for you! This follows a week or so after [Out of Step, Chapter 14 of The New Arrangement](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22326079/chapters/57904432), where Crowley finally convinces Aziraphale to contact Rosa.
> 
> It also takes place just after the [Chapter 1 of Third Eden](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23770906/chapters/57098272), where Datura and Junior do their pub crawl and Junior decides to buy the land to create his own place to live.
> 
> The title is from Shakepeare's _The Tempest_ (5:1).

> _Dear Rosa,_
> 
> _I will be in town this coming Thursday, and thought we could meet for a walk in St. James Park around one. I suspect the ducks must be in need of attention._
> 
> _Your loving_
> 
> _Azirafather_

Rosa lowered the note, feeling the soft linen content of the paper under her fingers, imagining the press of his favourite nib into it as he gracefully shaped the letters, the gentle glisten of the wet ink fading as it sank into the surface of the paper and dried. It _felt_ like Azirafather.

Her throat closed up, and she put the paper down.

“What if she doesn’t come?” Aziraphale had said fretfully that morning as he settled the lapels of his coat at the door. Crowley handed him his bag.

“Then that’s how she chooses to respond,” he said. “But I don’t think she’ll ghost you, angel. She’s been well brought up.”

“If she comes and is painfully polite, that would be worse,” Aziraphale said, anxiety roiling in his stomach. It was ridiculous. He’d lied to God, for goodness sake. Why should he be so nervous about meeting his daughter?

“Either she shows up and you talk, or she doesn’t and you try again another time,” Crowley said. “Go on, angel. Enjoy your day.”

He stood now in the park, twisting his fingers together. The June day was warm and breezy, and people were enjoying it, walking the paths and eating lunches on the benches and grassy areas. The ducks eyed him, evaluating the potential for snacks.

He heard the church bells chime the hour.

_She’s always punctual. She’s not coming._

Aziraphale dithered. Part of him wanted to leave to avoid the increasing sense of failure. Part of him wanted to stay, ever hopeful, perched on the bench. In the end he stood awkwardly, shifting his weight from foot to foot, uncommitted to either decision.

Unexpectedly, he felt her coming from the southeast. He’d been looking and reaching north, which, he realized, was the direction of the bookshop in Soho.

But... she didn’t live there anymore.

Because he wasn’t expecting the different direction of her approach, he had not sensed her until she was quite close. He turned, caught even more off guard.

“Hello, Azirafather,” she said.

“Rosa,” he said, blinking. The heartbeat of his corporation sped up, and he felt prickles of anxiety.

She walked up to him and placed a cool kiss on his cheek. He felt like he was unable to move, as desperately as he wanted to reach for her.

“How is Father?” she said, stepping to the park bench and sitting down neatly. 

“Well. Father is… he’s well.”

“I’m glad.” Rosa folded her hands in her lap and looked up at him. “Do sit down, Azirafather. You look like you’re poised for flight.”

Aziraphale took hold of himself and sat down next to her. They looked over the grass and the path to the river.

“It’s a very pleasant day,” Rosa said.

“Oh yes,” he heard himself say in reply. “Quite. Although I hear the city has been dealing with quite a heatwave?”

“Last week, yes. Rather uncomfortable. I take it the weather was more pleasant by you?”

“Thankfully, yes. Early July can be unpredictable.”

What was going on? Aziraphale felt like he was alternately flailing and shrinking away, unable to properly get a handle on the situation.

“You… came from the southeast. I wasn’t… expecting that. You’re in…?”

“Lambeth. I’m living in rooms with a few other girls from school.”

“Lambeth,” Aziraphale echoed, trying to withhold his horror. Some of it must have slipped through, because the corner of Rosa's mouth quirked and she glanced at him.

“It’s not as bad as all that, Azirafather,” she said.

“Oh, I didn’t—I’m sure things have changed—”

“Since the 1860s? Yes, Azirafather, they’ve improved a bit.”

“I wish you’d move back to the bookshop,” he burst out. Immediately regretting the action, he twisted his hands in his lap and looked away.

“I don’t think I can do that,” Rosa said quietly, looking down at her own hands.

“You’d be safer.” He stood up and paced away, then paused. “Although… you can take care of yourself, can't you.” A wave of sadness came over him, a wave so overwhelming that he found himself fighting to breathe.

A gentle hand on his arm shocked him and he gasped, the action forcing air into his lungs. Rosa looked up at him with the uncanny, piercing look of evaluation she had exhibited since they’d all learned to shift to human shapes.

“You’re not well,” she said. “Come sit down, Azirafather.”

“I’m fine,” he said automatically. Then he bit his lip. “I’m... not fine,” Aziraphale said. “I’m not fine at all, in any way.”

The hand on his arm pressed just a bit more firmly.

“My darling,” he said, turning his head slightly look in her direction. “My sweet rose. Come home. I—I’m not—I _can’t_ ,” he finally managed to say, and without intending to, his entire heart was behind those two words. 

“Azirafather,” she said, and suddenly he had turned to face her and she had flung her arms around his neck and they were clinging to one another. _This_ was right. As wretched as they both felt, as much as they still had to work through, he was holding her, and her face was buried in his shoulder, and they both hurt so much, but they were hurting together at last.

“I,” he said, “have missed you _so much_.”

“Me too,” she gasped into his coat, quite ungrammatically for Rosa. “Azirafather, it’s been _awful_ , you cannot possibly—”

“It’s been ten weeks since we’ve spoken, my darling, ten weeks of misery and worry and—”

“We’re so ridiculous,” Rosa said, laughing through her tears. She stepped back and patted her damp cheeks. “Look at us, so sure the other wouldn’t talk to us, so we complied by staying away.”

Aziraphale encircled her with an arm and led her back to their bench.

“Your father told me so, and I didn’t believe him. I thought you could come home any time and you were... choosing not to.”

“Azirafather!” Rosa said. “We had that terrible argument! I couldn’t stay after that.”

“It would have been all right the next morning, I’m sure of it.”

“No, Azirafather,” Rosa said sadly, sinking down to the bench. “It wouldn’t have been. We were both too hurt to listen to one another.”

“May I… may I ask…?” Aziraphale trailed off, not entirely sure how to phrase his question, or even if he should ask it. Things were still so fragile. He sat down next to her, and she slipped her hand into his.

“Why?” Rosa said, so softly that he felt her answer more than heard it. He tightened his grip on her hand, cradling it between his fingers like a precious thing.

“Why,” he agreed, equally softly.

Rosa looked down at her hand in his, then up at the water.

“I tried to explain,” she said. “I did. But you caught me off guard and I wasn’t ready.” She smiled, but there was no humour to the movement of her lips. “Then again, I don’t know if I’d ever have felt ready. Deep down, I always knew you and Father wouldn’t have listened to my reasoning.”

“Be fair,” Aziraphale protested. “Do you really think we wouldn’t be able to…”

“Azirafather,” she said, glancing up at him, another quirk to her lips that had a bit more mischief to it. “Be honest. Would there ever have been a time when you’d have been able to listen to me explain without going off the deep end, as Angelica would say?”

Aziraphale didn’t like feeling as if someone had outthought him. He hmmed instead of agreeing or disagreeing.

“I did a lot of thinking over the past few years,” she said, looking at a duck as it approached, trying to evaluate the likelihood of there being snacks. “I really did, I promise. I weighed all the potential outcomes. This is why I ended up studying law, you know.”

“It is?”

“Yes. I researched contracts and legalities, and I read countless occult treatises on contracts with supernatural entities. I analyzed why they go wrong, and most of the time it’s because the summoner is thinking like a human, and assuming the other side will think the same way. I have an advantage there, having grown up in a family that doesn’t generally think the way humans do.”

“Well, thank goodness for that,” Azirapahle said fervently. “Although if I’d known where this would end, I’d have shut down our ostensibly theoretical study of angelic magics and how angels perceive rules and laws.” 

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Rosa said. “I am, Azirafather, truly. Because even though I know how angry and disappointed you and Father are… I made the decision I made, and I’m glad for it. It’s delicate, but… it’s holding. And… and it allowed me to be there for Anthony.”

They sat for a few minutes, watching the breeze ruffle the surface of the water. Aziraphale pulled a small container of peas out of his pocket, opened it, and offered it to Rosa.

“I thought bread was traditional.”

“Bread is terribly bad for ducks, or so Datura has informed me.” Aziraphale took a few of the peas out and tossed them for the waterfowl. Rosa followed his example.

“We could toss bread that _isn’t_ bad for them,” she mused.

“That would set a terrible example for those around us, and we mustn’t do that. It could further endanger the ducks.”

“And we are meant to guard and protect.” Rosa sighed and glanced up at the sky.

“My dear,” Aziraphale said gently. “That is not your job.”

“Isn’t it?” Rosa looked back at him. “Azirafather, we can do more than humans can. We’re _not_ human. Far from it. And if we’re not human, then what is our purpose?”

“To grow and live and be happy,” Aziraphale said, starting to feel as if he was losing control of the conversation somehow. “We _want_ you to be happy, to build happy lives.”

“But Azirafather,” she said, “just being happy isn’t my purpose. I know that’s what you and Father wanted for us, and for yourselves as well. But if I _can_ do more… isn’t it my responsibility?”

Aziraphale was definitely losing control of the discussion.

“Absolutely not. It is our job as your parents to protect _you_.”

“But Azirafather, if there is something I could do to ensure that all of you—you, Father, Anthony, Clem, Datura, Angelica—all stay safe… wouldn’t it be wrong of me to _not_ do it?”

“Stop,” he said, feeling a tinge of anxiety start to coil deep inside. “This isn’t about morality—”

“But it is.” Rosa smiled sadly. “Azirafather, if there was something you could do to ensure that everyone would stay safe… wouldn’t you do it? Even… even sacrifice yourself?”

Aziraphale stood up abruptly and took a shaky step. He wasn’t hearing this, _he wasn’t_.

“You would,” she said. “You know you would, Azirafather.”

 _I forgive you._ The words he’d spoken to Crowley a decade ago resonated in his heart. His declaration of love, his farewell, his blessing upon Crowley’s departure, before he stepped into the maelstrom that was his final attempt to convince Heaven to call off the war in order to save everything he loved.

“Azirafather?” Her voice sounded unsure. He needed to take hold of his panic.

“I understand.” His voice was husky, far from his usual light tones. He turned to face her. She had risen to her feet and looked young, much younger than she had in Paris and the day afterward. “I don’t agree with your decision, but… I understand why you made it.”

“I didn’t think there was another choice.”

“Rosa,” said Aziraphale. “There is _always_ another choice.”

Rosa rolled a pea between her fingertips.

“I just… I just felt that if I could convince them that they needed me, or could use me, then I could bargain safety for the rest of….”

“Oh, my Rosa.” Aziraphale vanished the container of peas from his hands and turned to her, gathering her close. She buried her head in his shoulder. “I kept your father at arm’s length for centuries to keep him safe. I created my own reality and believed it so hard that I’m fairly sure the scars will remain with me forever. I believed that if I could just get Heaven to see my point of view, the war would stop.”

“You thought everyone would be safe if you…” Rosa looked up at him. He smiled sadly and touched her cheek.

“If I could keep them safe by reshaping my own reality. I taught you more than I realized.”

“Father would say it is the angelic genes.”

“Your father also had his own habit of… well. Never mind for now.” Aziraphale gently rearranged a couple of her curls. “I ought to have known you’d have picked up my guardian tendencies.”

“I wanted everyone to be safe. Instead, I ended up needing everyone to help.”

“Your father proved to me that we are stronger together than alone.” He kissed her forehead. “I suppose you all had to learn that lesson yourselves.”

“But Father used to work alone, too,” Rosa observed.

“Usually to get me out of a sticky spot,” Aziraphale said ruefully. “His goals were….”

“The opposite of selfish?” Rosa said. “Done to protect you?”

“Hmm. Yes.” Aziraphale wrinkled his nose. He slid his hands down to loosely rest on her arms, and stepped back to look at her. “Perhaps it wasn’t all my fault.”

Rosa laughed ruefully.

“It’s a wonder we aren’t all out there acting independently to protect one another, really.”

“You are very brave,” Aziraphale said to her. “But so very foolish.”

“Thank you, yes, Angelica told me so very clearly. And then you and Father, as well.”

“What I find remarkable is _Clem_ ,” Aziraphale said, patting her arms before releasing them and producing the peas again. “How he knew and didn’t freeze up.”

“Well,” Rosa said. “You know that thing where normally you’d freak out at something, but it happens to someone else and to keep them calm you suppress your own panic? I think it was like that for Clem.”

“Once upon a time, the phrases ‘that thing’ and ‘freak out’ would never have crossed your lips, my love.”

“I spent eight years in school, Azirafather,” she said breezily.

“A terrible idea, in retrospect.”

“Clem has been really important to me,” Rosa said, regaining her serious demeanour. “I couldn’t have done this without him. He asks me questions and distracts me, or helps me work out my feelings about what I’ve done or have to do.”

“He’s a good boy,” Aziraphale murmured with a smile, scattering peas for the ducks, who had almost given up.

“Unlike certain daughters; yes, yes, I hear you.” Aziraphale began to protest, then realized she was teasing him.

“It’s good to have a friend like that,” he said instead.

Rosa sighed.

“It’s not like I have any other friends.”

“Oh, my dear.” Aziraphale lowered the hand that had been about to scatter more peas. “Have you not—”

“Azirafather,” she said. “Angelica said it right out loud during the fight. We’re not normal. Everyone we know will die and we’ll have to go on for who knows how long. It’s… it’s hard to get close to someone when you know that.”

Aziraphale paused.

“All we have is each other,” Rosa whispered. “I… I needed to try to protect them.”

Aziraphale felt the telltale prickle in his eyes that indicated tears were imminent.

“What did we do,” he whispered. “To what kind life did I doom you by believing in your father’s silly prank.”

“Well, how did you do it?”

“Bring you into existence?”

“No, Azirafather. How did you and Father live among mortals without losing your minds?”

“Well,” Aziraphale said. He swallowed a lump in his throat. “We… loved them, and we lost them. There was… a lot of mourning.” He cleared his throat again. “And, well… we had each other. We knew what the other was going through.”

“But you didn’t have companionship. You had to stay apart.”

“Apart. Yes.” Aziraphale closed his eyes for a moment.

“So you’ve done us a favour, really,” Rosa said. “At least we have one another. When we’re talking to each other, that is.”

“Yes.” Aziraphale shook his head. “Evidently I’ve also passed on my subpar ability to communicate with people I love.”

“We’re all just trying to do the best we can, Azirafather.” Rosa tucked her hand into his elbow and hugged his arm again. “None of us are perfect.”

“No,” Aziraphale murmured. “We aren’t, rather.”

They were quiet together for a few minutes.

“I’m sorry,” Rosa said finally. Aziraphale glanced at her. Her eyes were steady on the trees on the opposite bank. “I apologize. I meant to tell you and Father, I really did. I only wanted to be properly settled into it before I told you.”

“Oh. Oh, my dear.” Aziraphale felt sad, for some reason.

“I didn’t want you to find out any other way. But you did, and we had that terrible fight.”

“I remember,” he said.

“We’re talking in circles, aren’t we,” said Rosa. He smiled slightly.

“If there’s one thing I've learned from being with your father for a few millennia,” Aziraphale said, “it’s that retreading the same arguments and talking points is inevitable when one is trying to work something out.”

“Especially feelings,” Rosa agreed. 

They began to meander along the water’s edge through the park.

“You’ll have to forgive me,” he said. “I’m… not used to parenting, really. We’ve been muddling along so far. You’re still so _young._ And you took such a wretchedly enormous step, my love, without consulting anyone.”

“I made a decision. You have to let me do that,” she said patiently. “Whether it’s right or wrong, you have to _let_ me make my own choices.”

Aziraphale pressed his lips together and looked down at his hands, turning the container around and around.

“I love you too much,” he said. “I cannot bear to see you _hurt_ , my darling.”

“But you have to,” Rosa said gently. “Don’t you see? I know you’re a guardian. You have protection in your nature. But you can’t be a mama hen forever, Azirafather.”

He fiddled with the peas. The ducks started to grumble.

“If I make a mistake,” she said, “I need to work through that. _I_ need to find a solution. We’re not snabies in teacups, Azirafather. We’re not afraid of the dark, or having nightmares.”

“Junior was,” Aziraphale said, lifting his head and looking out over the river. “And he didn’t come to us.”

“Because,” Rosa said, gently slipping her hand around his elbow to hold his arm companionably again, “he was trying to figure it out on his own. Also,” she said, reaching her other hand into Aziraphale’s container of peas, “because Hastur was psychologically abusing him and succeeded in twisting Anthony’s reality enough that he physically _couldn’t_.” She withdrew a few peas and scattered them into the water. The ducks snapped after them greedily.

“It wouldn’t have happened if we’d paid more attention.” Aziraphale felt miserable. Rosa pulled him gently to a halt and hugged his arm closer.

“Azirafather, don’t. You reached out to him. Short of showing up on his doorstep and bodily carrying him home, the response was his to make. And anyway…” She trailed off and looked down at her shoes. “If I hadn’t made such a splash in Paris, you and Father would have followed up on Anthony. It would have turned out all right.”

“What happened to Anthony wasn’t your fault,” he said. Rosa sighed.

“I went into this intending to keep everyone safe. And this was happening, and no one knew.”

“To be fair,” Aziraphale mused, “Hastur would have done it anyway. Just for the sheer love of torturing someone.”

“Not just anyone. Someone who could have been Father, in another life.” Rosa shuddered. “He used Anthony to stand in for him.”

They were quiet for a few minutes, gently tossing peas to the ducks.

“You were a very foolish girl, you know,” Aziraphale finally murmured. “Heaven could have done the same to you in my place.” He felt the cold echo of his nightmare about Gabriel forcing each of his five children into the perfect soldier he had never been.

“Yes, well.” Rosa patted his arm. “So says the angel who handled temptations.”

“I didn’t sashay up to the gates of Hell and offer to do it openly,” he said with asperity. “And your father certainly didn’t make an appointment with Heaven to do the same.”

“Azirafather, Heaven and Hell are more than a good/bad dynamic. Order and chaos are more appropriate descriptors. That’s one of the things that fascinates me. A single act can have repercussions of both kinds.”

“Philosophy,” Aziraphale said. “Philosophy is for humans, darling. We’ve lived the good and evil.”

“You were part of the system, and it can be hard to see the system for what it is when you’re inside it,” Rosa said. “It’s… it’s a new world now, Azirafather. Good and evil aren’t absolutes. I think that’s one of the reasons the concept of offering my services was so intriguing, to me and to both Michael and Dagon. It was a chaotic move to keep order.”

“That’s your father in you,” Aziraphale said affectionately. “It was still an unadvisable move, darling.”

“Well,” Rosa sighed, “apart from the terrible way in which the news came out… it hasn’t been too bad?”

“It could have been a _thousand_ times worse. We could have lost both you and Junior.” Aziraphale swallowed down the panic that threatened to rise again at the thought. He and Crowley had had to work through an awful lot of aftershock emotion, sorting through feelings and belated terror for some time. Sometimes those aftershocks still resonated.

“You didn’t,” Rosa said softly, laying her hand on his arm again. “Azirafather, I’m here. Anthony is… well. He’s still with us.”

“But Junior won’t talk about it,” Aziraphale said fretfully. He started to walk again, Rosa moving with him easily. “He asked to be able to bring it up with us in his own time, and of course Father and I said yes, but I’m worried about him.”

“Of course you are,” Rosa said. “All of us were, too, when we found out. But all you can do is be there, Azirafather. Be there, and love him.”

“Does he talk to you?” Aziraphale asked wretchedly. “I—he must be talking to someone. I mean, I do hope he is. He’s… he’s avoiding your father, you know.”

Rosa shook her head.

“Of course he’s avoiding him, Azirafather. I’m sure every time he looks at Father, he sees all the terrible things Hastur showed him. And they were likely warped to seem worse than they were.”

“Oh, I have no doubt. Many of them were almost certainly exaggerated.” Others, however, may not have been, although he didn’t say this to Rosa. Aziraphale thought back to the day he had told the children the story of the Serpent of Eden, and how Crowley had insisted afterward that the angel never diminish his demonic nature or his role as a chaotic agent. He had done rather questionable things by the order of Hell, and had done them with style. Others, however, he had worked around and kept to the letter of the assignment while minimizing the damage. Crowley was clever, incredibly clever. It was one of the things he adored about him.

“I… I have to ask,” he said. “Junior won’t speak with us about it. What… what exactly… happened? I know,” he added quickly, “I know that he’s asked us to wait until he’s ready to talk, and I want to, I do, but Rosa, darling, we don’t know what happened and we don’t know how to _help_ him. He stayed in his room for two months, and now suddenly he’s going out all day and we don’t know where or to do what.”

Rosa, looked down at the path thoughtfully for a few steps.

“I don’t know everything. I don’t think any of us ever will. But it’s likely that I know more than you do. I’ll tell you what I can without trespassing on Anthony’s right to share what he wants to share about his own experience.”

“Anything you can tell us would help,” Aziraphale said.

“I found out,” she said, “when he had a nightmare the night we all came back from Paris. I’d come back to the house intending to prepare to leave before anyone woke.”

“You did,” Aziraphale reminded her, with a touch of bitterness. "I read the note." She had the grace to look apologetic.

“I know. But I left because of what Junior told me. I’d meant to go back to London and move out of the bookshop directly that day. Instead, I… went to Hell.”

Aziraphale tripped. Rosa steadied him until he recovered his balance.

“You _what?_ ” he said. “You didn’t mention that part when we all spoke after Angelica brought you back from wherever she took you all.”

“I thought it best not to bring it up. I apologize for allowing you and Father to think that Hastur had come on his own.”

“But _why?_ ”

“In the greenhouse, where I found him after the nightmare, Anthony told me what was going on. How Hastur had invaded his dreams, how he was training Anthony to be an agent of Hell, like Father had been. Azirafather, it was awful. Hastur had convinced Anthony that if he didn’t do the things Hastur set up for him to do, Hell would come after him and… hurt him, in retribution for Father’s betrayal.”

Aziraphale’s gorge rose.

“I didn’t say as much to Anthony, but Azirafather, they were setting him up. Either they would turn him to be an agent of Hell, or kill him and take his soul. If we even have those. So no matter what the outcome, Hell would win and Father would have… gotten back into the business. You know there would have been no stopping him from revenge, Azirafather. And they would have destroyed him, once he made the first move.”

Aziraphale would have been at Crowley’s right hand himself, flaming sword at the ready, prepared to bring down the walls of Hell and destroy waves of its denizens if Hell had killed their firstborn. He didn’t say as much to Rosa. Perhaps she knew.

“It didn’t go that way, however,” he said.

“No. Because I found out, and invoked my contract clause that outlined non-interference with my family. I still don’t know if Hastur was aware of it and ignored it, or if he didn’t know, but Hell isn’t big on the benefit of the doubt. And… and I was… I was so _angry_ , Azirafather.”

He felt her arm trembling where it was looped through his, and covered her hand with his own.

“I know, my love,” he said. “I know.”

“I had gone to such lengths to make sure you’d all be safe, and yet—”

“But you did,” said Aziraphale. She looked up at him, face blotchy from struggling against tears. “You did keep us safe, my darling. As soon as you knew Junior’s danger, you went to Hell and fought for him the way you knew best. The contract you’d made with them saved Junior. My courageous girl. You brave, _clever_ girl.”

The tears trembling on Rosa’s pale lashes finally fell. She collapsed against him, weeping, and he stroked her back soothingly, allowing his angelic nature to pulse gently past his corporation to enfold her gently in love and blissful light. He kept murmuring to her as she cried, words of comfort and appreciation and gratitude, of peace, and love, so much love. The words were for him as much as for her benefit, and for Junior, and for Crowley, too. What a tangle of pain and anger and fear it had all been.

“There now,” he said, drawing a handkerchief from inside his coat and gently dabbing her face. She took it and did a more thorough job, then looked up at him, smiling bravely.

“Well,” she said. “There we are. Have we talked it all out yet?”

“I believe so.”

“What… what do we do now?”

“Now,” he said, taking her hand firmly, “I am taking you to tea, because I am perishing for cakes and you need a rather strong pot of darjeeling, my love.”

“Tea solves everything,” Rosa said with a small laugh. He squeezed her hand gently.

“While there’s tea, there’s hope,” he quoted. “Come along. We also need to discuss how long it will take you to pack.”

“Pack?”

“Someone needs to manage the bookshop,” he pointed out. “I think it would make an excellent summer job for you. I don’t trust anyone else, you know.”

Rosa laughed again as he steered them towards the closest exit. She untangled their fingers and slid her arm around his waist instead, resting her head on his shoulder with a contented sigh. He put his arm around her shoulders and gently pressed her closer.

He had her back again. 

Crowley would be insufferable when he found out.

  
  



	16. REDRAWING THE LINES

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angelica versus Rosa, Round Two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heya! With relation to the last couple of chapters, this chapter probably takes place sometime before Rosa's reconciliation with Azirafather, but not too much before. The timeline isn't terribly important on it. What IS important is that these dummy sisters interact again in a productive manner.

Rosa was surprised when Angelica’s dinner invitation reached her.

_7:30. My place. Bring drinks._

Well. It wasn’t like Rosa had any prior engagements to attend to, not tonight.

Rosa selected a deliciously tart white wine from Azirafather’s stash (stealing from the bookshop when she didn't live there anymore was...well. Best not to dwell on it) and brought it with her to Angelica’s flat, a posh little penthouse with tasteful décor that defied Angelica’s usual rough-and-tumble presentation, though the smart blazer over a well-coordinated athleisure look and braided hair was becoming as much Angelica as the grass stains on her favorite jeans. She accepted Rosa’s curtsy with an eye-roll and a half-grin, which was as much of a welcome as Rosa needed, all told.

“I bought Thai,” Angelica announced, scooping the wine bottle from Rosa’s grasp. “Should go rather nicely with this, actually.”

“Excellent.” Rosa divested herself of her coat and shoes and followed Angelica into the flat. Rosa had never been here before in person, though she’d seen backdrops of it plenty in Angelica’s Instagram feed. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“Been a bit since we talked one-on-one,” Angelica said from the cavern of her kitchen. Rosa sat daintily at the bar and waited for Angelica to get done pouring the wine. The food was already spread across the bar according to their preferences, with a frankly obscene amount of pad thai in the center within easy reach. Angelica emerged with two wine glasses and passed one over as she settled herself into the other chair at the bar. “Figured it was time for a check-in.”

“I see.” Rosa began going to work on her curry first. “Go on, then.”

“In a minute,” Angelica said. “Food first.”

Rosa acknowledged this with a nod and together the two of them demolished most of the spread in silence. This was not usual, but given how fraught the last few months had been, Rosa would take what she could get. When she was left stirring the last few peppers around her takeout box while Angelica finished off her third glass of wine, she felt it had been long enough. The look Angelica shot her way seemed to say much the same.

“Couch,” Angelica grunted, and took the remainder of the wine bottle with her as she hopped off the bar stool. Rosa followed and waited patiently while Angelica took another generous glug from the bottle and passed it over.

“The thing is,” Angelica said, and burped. “The thing is,” she started again, “is…why’d you do it?”

“I believe I outlined why in our first conversation about it,” Rosa said wryly, thumbing the imprint of Angelica’s greasy mouth off the lip of the bottle.

“No,” Angelica shook her head, “why’d you suddenly include all of us, when it came to Hastur?”

Rosa blinked.

“Like,” Angelica continued, “you’d been doing all this on your own, all secretive-like, and suddenly, you want to include us. I just don’t get why you didn’t take him down yourself.”

“Well, there are several reasons,” Rosa said, taking a long pull on the wine herself. “Do you want the practical reasons first, or the sentimental ones?”

“Practical,” Angelica grimaced.

“Right,” Rosa nodded. “Well. For starters, I’d already expended a good amount of energy making a…show of force, I suppose. In Hell. It takes surprisingly little to spook average demons when you look like me and can…you know.” Rosa added a bit of a halo gleam to her hair, and Angelica snorted, grinning. “For showing someone like Dagon that I meant business…took a bit more effort. More of a hat trick than anything, hopefully showing a bigger bark than bite, but it’s not hard to instill fear of the unknown into creatures that haven’t changed for millennia.”

“So you couldn’t have taken Hastur on your own, then,” Angelica said.

“Probably not even at my full strength,” Rosa shrugged. “Azirafather could, of course, but I’m not Azirafather, I’m me. Much younger, much less powerful, much less experienced.”

“Hang on, I need you to repeat that into a microphone so I can fall asleep to a recording of it,” Angelica said, and Rosa rolled her eyes, passing back the wine bottle.

“Charming.” She stretched and re-settled into the couch, a little looser than before. “So. Couldn’t have got rid of Hastur without help in the first place, and since he drew first blood, so to speak, I got it in writing from Dagon that we were allowed to strike back without repercussions, which leaves you lot untouched as intended. Could probably have made it so Father and Azirafather could take a chunk out of him without reprisals as well, but…it seemed…better, somehow. For us to take care of it for them.”

“They worked so hard to get to this point,” Angelica sighed, pushing her flyaway stray curls off of the shaved side of her head and toying with her pale streak. “You…do understand that, right? I mean, I know you do, but you do, right?”

“I do,” Rosa nodded. “Why do you think I went through the trouble in the first place?”

“Because you’re mental,” Angelica replied, grinning. Rosa snorted. “Look…I still don’t agree with what you did. And I don’t think it’s going to end well. Probably too soon to tell what kind of disaster this is going to shape up to be. But.” Angelica set the wine bottle, now empty, down on the coffee table, and crossed her arms over her chest. “I can…respect…that you’re trying to protect our family. I can appreciate the sacrifices you’re making. I don’t think they’re necessary or smart sacrifices, but…” Angelica sighed. “I guess it put us in a position to get back at Hastur for everything he did to us as kids and everything he did to Anthony recently, and that was bloody amazing. So. What I mean to say, is. Um.”

Rosa waited patiently for Angelica to find her words, sitting calm and still and trying not to smile.

“I’m sorry for leaving,” Angelica finally blurted. “And. I’m gonna try to stick around. Because someone will need to pull your tail from the fire if and when this all goes horribly wrong.”

Rosa blinked. That…wasn’t quite what she’d been expecting. Angelica squirmed and glared at a spot on the couch between them. Rosa reached over and gently laid a hand on Angelica’s knee.

“Hey,” Rosa said softly. “It’s alright, you know, I know you’re mostly being protective. It’s what you do.”

“I’m not mostly being anything,” Angelica sniffed, but put her hand over Rosa’s. “Are we good?”

“We’re good,” Rosa nodded, and squeaked when Angelica flopped over and spread-eagled into her lap.

“Finally,” Angelica groaned. “You would not _believe_ the idiots in my classes—”

Rosa nestled into the cushions and listened as Angelica unloaded several months’ worth of complaints about Other People, smiling gently as she gesticulated and waved her arms too close to Rosa’s face for comfort. Rosa undid Angelica’s braid, sifting Angelica’s thick wild red curls through her fingers and listening with more attention than usual.

When they sobered up at the end of the night, Rosa went ahead and left the bottle at Angelica’s. Seemed like the proper way to make apologies for things she wasn’t sorry for, exactly, but was sorry for the collateral emotional damage incurred.

The chocolate torte hiding in Angelica’s fridge would probably help, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adult life is all about finding the common ground with people you disagree with--especially when those people are loved ones and the disagreement has been especially dire. Sometimes it's reconcilable. Sometimes it isn't. Just takes work to find out which relationships are worth preserving.


	17. VALENTINE'S DAY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Valentine's Day. Rosa has a mission.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey...so...this went places. Timeline-wise, this takes place BEFORE the full Round and Round arc, right between HOLIDAY BLUES and April in Paris. 
> 
> Warning-wise, I would warn that there are sexual innuendos and some sensuality at play in this chapter, and an implied one-night stand, but nothing at all explicit. Plenty of sadness, though, because what would this fic be without a minor existential crisis?

Black was never Rosa’s color but she still looked very good in it, if she said so herself.

The job was simple: cause a ruckus on the humans’ self-proclaimed Love Holiday. Rosa could have done this any number of ways, but she had to admit, there was a certain amount of allure in taking on a Lust temptation, rather than stirring up a riot or some other mischief. This felt quieter. Calmer. Less hands-on. Surely walking around in a short black dress with a plunging neckline would stir up enough trouble to qualify. No doubt they would be expecting her to be more high-key about it, but Rosa didn’t do high-key unless directly ordered, and more fool Hell for not being more specific.

She wore her hair down in gently curling white-gold waves and with so much of her pale skin on display, the black silk made her look luminous under the streetlights. The red lipstick was almost too much, a blood-red shade cheekily named “Sinful”, but if Rosa was going to darken her lashes and wear comically high heels, she was going to go all the way about it. Foregoing a coat was also intentional, despite the February chill, and Rosa had already felt the surprised, sometimes burning gazes of a few people on her way to the dive bar she was starting at.

It felt different, to be parading her body around like an accessory and not like the home of her spirit. She almost felt detached from it. Perhaps that was some kind of defense mechanism, in case the night went poorly. Or…some other direction. Rosa wasn’t thinking too hard about it. That was the key, for this kind of thing: don’t think too hard about it. Impossible, normally, but dressed like a different person, it was almost like playing a role. Rosa liked theatre well enough; this was just a character she was putting on for the night, a sultry temptress who glowed like starlight under the dim lights. Rosa could feel the pulses of desire in the room shooting up like triggered bombs in a minefield as she walked herself from the entrance to the bar and ordered a gin and tonic.

It didn’t take long. Crowd this desperate, her so entrancing? The single folks, she graced with sideways glances and nods. The ones who had come here with somebody and were shooting looks whenever their partners were distracted? Rosa smiled at them, inviting, her teeth flashing like light off the skin of a desirable apple. Small thoughts, stoking small disappointments. If she played her cards right, there might even be a small brawl. But that didn’t appeal, frankly. She left the bar and went to another one. Then a third. A fourth. Perhaps the trail of broken hearts and directionless lust in her wake wasn’t so dramatic as sacking half of London, but what was it Father always said? Something about the ripple effect?

She ended her night at the Ritz, at the Rivoli Bar. It seemed wrong, which meant it was probably the right move, in this case. The clientele wasn’t quite so desperate as some of the other places she’d visited that night, but there were certainly plenty of eyes on her used to getting their own way, and those types were always fun to rile up. Rosa scooped her hair to lay over her shoulder, exposing her back and her neck to whoever happened to be watching, and daintily sipped her cocktail, waiting.

The CEO who’d left his secretary upstairs in a room and had come downstairs for a drink and a breather; the doctor who had a husband at home with whom he was fighting; the socialite trophy wife looking for a rebound from her latest glamorous breakup; the government official frustrated with her job and needing to blow off steam. Rosa chatted with them all, flirted, gave smoky glances from beneath her lashes, teased with the cherry from her drink. When the conversations were over, Rosa returned to the small army of glasses next to her, wondering if she couldn’t pull one more off for the night. A glass of ice water was set down in front of her, and Rosa looked up, blinking. The bartender gave her a smile and slid it into her hands.

“Your technique could use some work,” they said, and Rosa arched an eyebrow.

“Oh?” Rosa took a sip, letting her lipstick smudge for the first time all night against the glass. “Which technique would that be?”

“Your seduction technique,” the bartender said, leaning on the bar and grinning at her. “Unless the goal was to tease them, in which case, well done, you.”

“Maybe.” Rosa looked the bartender over. Young, clean-cut, handsome. No partner waiting at home, no indulgence that needed poking. “I’m sure I could have gotten them if I wanted them.”

“Well, looking like you do, I assume you don’t have to try all that hard,” the bartender replied, their dark eyes twinkling. Rosa smiled and saluted with her water cup. “Some people are just easy.”

“Poor things,” Rosa said, which garnered a laugh. It made her feel warm, the first thing all night that had done so. Rosa hadn’t even realized how cold she was until that moment.

“Now, if it were me, and I was trying to take you home,” the bartender said, “I wouldn’t start with the obvious.”

“The obvious?”

“Every single person who’s approached you tonight has complimented one of four things, I assume,” the bartender said, leaning in like sharing a secret, and Rosa found herself leaning in, as well, chasing the laughter in their eyes. “Your hair, which is lovely, your skin, which is effervescent, your eyes, which are exotic, and your breasts, which are monuments of divinity and deserve to be worshipped.”

Rosa laughed, and then she snorted, and then the bartender was laughing too, which rather than making Rosa feel as if she was being made fun of, was instead a gentle, bubbling sort of feeling in her stomach. Rosa drank her water to ease it.

“Full marks, all,” Rosa nodded. “I can’t tell you how many people tonight have wanted to pay homage to my breasts especially.”

“Shows they’ve got eyes, at least,” the bartender nodded.

“But you wouldn’t start there,” Rosa said.

“No,” the bartender shook their head. “I would start with this.” The bartender extended their hand. “Hey. I’m Mal. Nice to meet you.”

“Rosa,” Rosa smiled, and shook their hand. “Then what?”

“Well, then I might ask if you’re from around here,” Mal replied. “Or if you’re a student at university.”

“Yes and yes,” Rosa nodded. “Studying law.”

“Oh, the law,” Mal grinned. “Never had a head for it, myself, but my parents wanted me to try, at least.”

“How does one go from studying law to tending a bar at the Ritz?” Rosa asked.

“Well, it’s a fantastic story, really full of twists and turns and the odd sea serpent,” Mal said, and Rosa laughed again. “I’d love to tell you over dinner sometime, is what I would say if I was trying to court you. If I was just trying to take you home, I would tell you that it involved a lot of shouting and soul-searching and a fair amount of daddy issues.”

“I see,” Rosa nodded. “The context matters.”

“Oh, context is everything,” Mal smiled. “What context brings you out here, I might ask in that hypothetical situation of getting us from here to my place?”

“Am I being honest?” Rosa asked, tilting her head and toying with her hair. “Or am I flirting?”

“Whichever suits you most comfortably,” Mal replied. “For myself, I’d hope for honesty. Makes for a more intimate experience.”

“Intimate,” Rosa pondered. “Well. What brings me out here is work, I might say. I’d tell you the details, but then I might have to kill you.”

“I might find that unbelievably sexy, if also very cheesy,” Mal smiled, folding their arms and leaning in towards Rosa further. “I also don’t think I believe you, but I’m not going to push, because boundaries are important. You can see how this makes me at least a halfway decent person whom you might be tempted to hook up with at least once, if this were a situation where I was attempting to woo you for the night.”

“I can certainly tell that,” Rosa said. There was something funny happening to her body, something unfamiliar but not entirely unwelcome. “In this hypothetical situation, Mal, would it shock you to know your target was a blushing virgin unaccustomed to the world?”

“Well, I might reassure her that the purity of virginity is a social construct, but if she’s not interested, I would understand entirely and call off my advances forthwith,” Mal said, and though the smile never left their face, their eyes did grow more serious. Rosa felt her breath catch.

“And…if she was interested?” Rosa asked. Mal smiled.

“If she was interested,” Mal said gently, “I would tell her I get off in about twenty minutes, and live fairly close by. Or I get an employee’s discount on rooms at the Ritz, if she prefers something more discreet or luxurious. Whichever she prefers.”

At some point, Rosa wasn’t sure when, her face and Mal’s had gotten awfully close, close enough for their breaths to mingle and for Rosa to feel the heat Mal was putting off.

“Here’s fine,” Rosa murmured. “Not as far to go.”

“Whatever you want,” Mal replied, and gently ran their knuckles against Rosa’s cheek. “Twenty minutes.”

Rosa nodded, and Mal pulled back to finish their shift, leaving Rosa nearly breathless in her seat and thrumming at every nerve ending she had.

When Mal came around the bar at the end of their shift and extended their dark hand for Rosa to take, Rosa didn’t hesitate.

.

For the first time in a very long time, Rosa slept, though when her eyes fluttered open she was still awake long before Mal, who was breathing slowly and deeply nearby. Rosa’s throat bobbed. They were so very beautiful. Rosa could have spent days cataloging the texture of their skin and the shades of brown and bronze therein. She was amazed at herself, frankly, that she had done something so bold as to jump into bed with a stranger. But, oh, what a stranger.

What a lovely, mortal stranger.

Rosa was perhaps more than a little superhumanly quiet as she slipped from the bed and gathered her things. She flicked her wrist and summoned a sheet of lovely vellum from her desk and a fountain pen and paused with the nib above the paper, watching the ink bead up but not fall, paralyzed for a moment. She could give Mal her number. She could probably court Mal for quite a while, if things went well. Grow old. Only. She wouldn’t be growing old. They would. They would grow old and die and even if her rather non-human eccentricities didn’t put them off, there would always be that between them: Death would come for Mal, and unless something went very seriously wrong, Death would not come for her.

The pen shook. Rosa’s breath caught so fiercely in her chest she banished it entirely.

The pen shook.

.

Mal hadn’t really been expecting Rosa to stick around, but they had been hoping that maybe they could do breakfast before she split. They must have been sleeping hard; Mal hadn’t even heard her leave. There was no trace of Rosa anywhere in the room except for the cold, rumpled sheets, and the small card laying on her pillow, which simply read, in pretty calligraphy, “thanks.”

Mal took the card and leaned back against the bed, sighing. Well. They weren’t one to get caught up in disappointment. It had been a fun night, at least.

Their tips were noticeably better for the rest of their tenure at the Rivoli, and they never had trouble catching a cab again.


	18. WAR AND PEACE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time Clem and Angelica had a talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a formatting note, this takes place entirely in snake form, so the method of talking for them is italics; I'm not sure if this will cause problems for people or not but I am open to changing the format of this particular chapter just in case, since it's rare we get a wall of italics like this chapter in the Wiggleverse. 
> 
> As a content note, Clem and Angelica have a talk around a year after the conclusion of the Round and Round arc (so, for curious parties, probably around the same time as Chapter 3 of Third Eden, when Junior has already showed off his hobbit house, the girls have reconciled, and life is going on sort of as normal, whatever the new normal is now).

Angelica, being a master of the art, knew when she was getting the cold shoulder.

Rosa’s little experiment came to light, with disastrous results. Anthony’s hidden traumas were uncovered. Ever so slowly and delicately, the family was getting back to some semblance of normal, a year or so later—Rosa was back in the bookshop, Junior had his new place, Datura was experimenting with being good at even more skills, Angelica herself was making good time on her degree.

As for Clem, Angelica only knew in broad strokes what he was up to, because Clem refused to speak to her.

Oh, he was polite, of course. He answered questions when spoken to (or texted), he was cordial in every detail. But he turned down social invitations and he never initiated conversations with her anymore. Angelica had thought he would calm down after a few weeks, a few months maybe. This was just getting ridiculous now. He wouldn’t even respond to her hints that they needed to talk.

Well. If he refused to be an adult about it and talk like grownups, then she would just have to corner him to at least get an explanation. If he was going to shut her out, she at least deserved to know why.

(She knew why. She had an idea, anyway. It didn’t make it any easier to swallow.)

Angelica planned a weekend home, one where she knew Clem would also be present, and when the moment came, she plopped herself down on his back in snake form and curled herself around him so she couldn’t be easily thrown.

 _You’re avoiding me_ , Angelica hissed, _and you’re going to tell me why._

Other siblings would have writhed, tried to toss her. Clem, always aware of his greater size and bulk, merely shifted.

 _What gives you that impression?_ Clem asked, mild as milk.

 _I’m not an idiot,_ Angelica snarled. _Stop treating me like one._

 _No, I suppose you aren’t,_ Clem replied, but said nothing else. Angelica, patient as him in many ways, waited. She almost thought he’d drifted back off to sleep before he spoke again. _You abandoned Rosa._

 _I got some space from Rosa,_ Angelica retorted.

 _Please let me finish,_ Clem said, somehow even more softly, and Angelica shut up. _I realize that what she did was reckless and difficult to process and you aren’t wrong for needing your space from that. I did, too, when I found out. But._

 _But?_ Angelica prompted, more gently.

 _But you left her,_ Clem murmured. _You turned your back on her, at a time when you knew she probably needed support more than a talking to. And. If you…if you, our protector, the strongest of us, would just abandon her like that…would you do that to the rest of us? If we did something you didn’t like? Just…leave us high and dry to face the consequences alone, no matter how much we deserved it?_

This gave Angelica pause. In her own mind, of course, she was justified. She was. Even Rosa had admitted it. Even _Clem_ had admitted it. But. Clem also wasn’t wrong to be afraid, because he _was_ afraid, not angry. Angelica mulled this over, tried to plan her response.

 _What I did…_ she said slowly, _…what I did was take the healthiest option available to us at the time. I’m not you, Clem, I can’t put aside my anger if it helps someone else. Rosa was wrong to do what she did. She put us all in the line of fire when we could have flown under the radar indefinitely. Heaven and Hell didn’t care about us, if they even knew about us at all. Now they do, and that’s a fear we lived under for so long finally given some tangibility, and it’s her fault. She put our family at risk and I couldn’t stand by and watch it happen, or watch her lie to our parents about it._ Angelica curled more tightly around Clem’s body, hissing faintly. _Maybe I could’ve been more mature about it, but at the time, if I’d had my way, she wouldn’t have been coming to family functions. She doesn’t get to dunk our family in the danger zone and act like she did it for our own good, no matter what she’s managed to tell herself._

 _Well, consider alternatives,_ Clem said. _Junior was being tortured by Hastur while this was happening. And it would have kept on going without her interference in it. And, more crucially, if we, any of us, had done anything to interfere, Hell might have had the excuse they needed to come after Father and Azirafather again, and if Hell made a move, Heaven would, too. One rogue agent of Hell knew about us, remembered us from years ago, and when he felt the moment was right, he struck again. Without Rosa, we wouldn’t have stood a chance._

Angelica seethed. _There’s no guarantee Hell would have backed Hastur up for meddling with the traitors. It might have turned out fine._

 _It might have,_ Clem agreed. _It could just as easily not have. And that’s my point: you are so wrapped up in the bad you’re sure is happening, you’re discounting the good that did happen. And maybe I’m doing the opposite. But the point is that what happened, happened, regardless of our theories one way or the other._ Clem flexed, loosened the coils of Angelica’s body around his own some. _I am hurt because you not only left a sibling in need, but you were vindictive about it. You were glad when the secret came out in the worst possible way, because finally someone else was reacting to Rosa the way you thought needed to happen. There was shouting. There were harsh things said. Father and Azirafather were heartbroken about it for weeks. Rosa was devastated. And you were_ happy _about it._

In this, Angelica had no defense, and she knew it. They were both silent for a long time after this, until Clem lifted his great head and slithered it back to be level with Angelica’s.

 _What if it had been me?_ Clem asked. _What if I had made a deal with Heaven and Hell? Would you have been glad, to see it crash around my ears like that? Would you have been sniping at me for months, egging me to tell people before I was ready?_

 _No,_ Angelica blurted. _No, I—_

_Then why did you do it to her?_

_Because she’s self-righteous,_ Angelica snapped. _Because she’s always so convinced that she’s right, even when she’s wrong. Because she did this without asking or consulting anyone, and I know you wouldn’t do something like that. You would think it over even longer, and you would get outside opinions, and you wouldn’t act like your way was best. You wouldn’t put all our necks on the chopping block on the off chance you could save us from the fire instead._ She reared her head. _Yes, Clematis, I was angry with her, and I was downright giddy when it was all finally out in the open, because unlike you, I can’t justify her to myself. I mean, I couldn’t. I can, now, with the whole…Hastur thing. I’m not going to be an idiot and deny that it didn’t help then. But at the time…at the time, she was just Rosa being Rosa and inflicting her god complex on everyone and painting targets on our backs. And, frankly, I’m not entirely convinced that isn’t part of what she did._

Clem’s yellow eyes stared into Angelica’s blue ones, both unblinking as biology dictated but also intense as the conversation required.

 _You were angry because she did something you couldn’t protect her from,_ Clem said, quiet, simple.

 _Yeah,_ Angelica hissed, feeling the familiar prickle across her scales that meant tears would be happening in another form, _yeah, that’s exactly it._

 _And because you felt powerless,_ Clem continued, _you lashed out. In whatever way was available to you at the time._

Angelica just nodded, her head sinking back down to their overlapped coils. Yeah, that also tracked.

Clem very gently booped Angelica’s snout with his own.

 _I understand,_ he said. _I felt powerless and combated that by helping, because that’s what I felt like I should and could do for her. You felt powerless and took it back by walking away. I see now._

Feeling miserable and wrung-out, Angelica flopped her head to rest on Clem’s snout, feeling the tickle of his tongue on the underside of her belly.

 _I’m sorry for being cross with you for so long,_ Clem murmured. _I didn’t understand then. But I think I do now._

 _It happens,_ Angelica mumbled, and rubbed the top of her head against the top of Clem’s snout. _Sorry for being a git about everything._

 _Not everything,_ Clem said, serene and calm and one with the universe again, it seemed. _Not that this hasn’t been great, but I think it’s naptime, don’t you?_

 _Please,_ Angelica groaned, and transferred her length entirely to the top of Clem’s head, long regarded as the best nap spot since Clem’s size outgrew Father’s. It didn’t fix everything, or really anything, but it did feel better to no longer be on the outs with Clem.

Okay. That was enough personal growth for one day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The original title for this chapter was "Angry Clem", because in my original vision of the chapter, that's where it was going. Cookies to the person who can spot the exact moment when I realized that chapter title was unfit.


End file.
